As reported by this firm, the European Court of Justice struck
down the European Commission's Safe Harbor Decision ("Safe
Harbor") in October 2015.1 Until its invalidation,
Safe Harbor formed the framework that facilitated transfers of
personal data from EU citizens to US companies for over 15 years.
Fortunately for US companies faced with the daunting task of
complying with the EU's stringent data-protection laws, a new
framework has been approved, the EU-US Privacy Shield
("Privacy Shield"). The US Department of Commerce began
accepting applications for self-certification under Privacy Shield
on August 1, 2016.2
Privacy Shield differs from its predecessor by imposing both
stronger compliance obligations on US companies and stricter
monitoring and enforcement requirements on the US
government.3 US companies that do business in the EU or
with its citizens, including companies with a website accessible by
EU citizens, should strongly consider self-certification, but
