Global Protection Through Mutual Recognition

At present, there is a visible mismatch between the globalisation of data and the multinational approach to privacy regulation.  Data is global by nature as, regulatory limits aside, it runs unconstrained through wired and wireless networks across countries and continents.  Put in a more poetic way, a digital torrent of information flows freely in all possible directions every second of the day without regard for borders, geographical distance or indeed legal regimes and cultures.  Data legislation on the other hand is typically attached to a particular jurisdiction – normally a country, sometimes a specific territory within a country and occasionally a selected group of countries.  As a result, today, there is no such thing as a single global data protection law that follows the data as it makes its way around the world.