EU-U.S. Privacy Shield Is Go…Nearly

Article by James Drury-Smith, Christian Schröder, Kolvin Stone, Antony P. Kim and Aravind Swaminathan

On 29 February 2016 the European Commission issued the legal texts of the EU-U.S Privacy Shield which aims to replace the defunct EU-U.S Safe Harbor Framework as a legitimate mechanism for transferring personal data from the EU to the U.S.

In contrast to its predecessor, the Privacy Shield contains commitments from US government in relation to controls on access to personal data by public authorities. This is an aspect of the new scheme which aims to address the jurisprudence of the Court of Justice of the European Union and criticisms of the previous Safe Harbor Framework.