Agreement On EU-U.S. Privacy Shield To Replace Safe Harbor Faces Hurdles

Negotiators from the European Commission and the United States have announced an agreement to replace the U.S.-EU Safe Harbor Framework for certain cross-border data transfers which was struck down last October by the European Union's Court of Justice. However, complete details of the agreement have not yet been made available, and significant hurdles remain before it can take effect.

Background

The European Commission's Data Protection Directive requires that countries to which the personal data of EU residents are transferred maintain adequate standards for data protection (to see a previous D&G Alert on data protection, click here). Over 15 years ago, the Safe Harbor program was put in place to enable the transfer of personal data from EU residents to companies in the United States in a manner that, it was expected, was in compliance with the EU standards.