Advocate General Bot yesterday delivered his opinion to the
Court of Justice of the European Union
("CJEU") in the landmark case of
Schrems v Data Protection Commissioner. This is a
hugely significant case which will impact on thousands of
multinational companies, many of whom operate in Ireland, who rely
on the Safe Harbour scheme to legitimise transfers of personal data
to the US.
As discussed in our
blog post from June 2014, this case involves a preliminary
reference from the Irish High Court to the CJEU regarding the
ability of the Irish Data Protection Commissioner
("DPC") to block transfers of data to
the US in light of Edward Snowden's revelations concerning the
National Security Agency's PRISM program and the mass
surveillance of data in the US. Mr Schrems had argued that
transfers of personal data from Facebook Ireland to Facebook Inc.
in the US should be blocked in light of these revelations.
The DPC refused to investigate this complaint on the basis
