EU Says That UK Data Protection Rules Are ‘Adequate’

The European Union (EU) has now officially agreed to accepts the UK’s current Data Protection standards after a discussion which has been going on for over a year and the EU confirms that that UK data protection standards are “adequate” for the next four years. This important ruling allows digital information continue to flow between the UK and the EU internal market.

The EU has, however, warned the British government that the decision could be revoked “immediately” if it sees weakening UK standard and Brexit supporters in the the Westminster Parliament are pressing Prime Minister Johnson to ditch the “prescriptive and inflexible” EU GDPR regime.

Organisations that shares data between the UK and EU could be heavily affected if Brussels decides to withdraw adequacy.

Indeed, a  Taskforce set up by the Prime Minister has the mission to “seize new opportunities from Brexit” said GDPR should be replaced with UK laws on data protection. The EU’s GDPR “overwhelms people with consent requests and complexity they cannot understand while unnecessarily restricting the use of data for worthwhile purposes”, states the  Taskforce report on Innovation, Growth and Regulatory Reform.  “The UK’s departure from the EU after 45 years offers a one-off opportunity to set out a bold new UK regulatory framework based on a set of principles embedded in UK common law, which prioritises innovation, growth and inward investment as part of the UK’s new global trading freedom, building on the UK’s global reputation for leadership in setting the highest standards of environmental and consumer protection." 

The Taskforce says that consumers needed stronger rights, while data should allow the UK to capitalise on Artificial Intelligence and data-driven healthcare and Prime Minister Johnson has promised to give their report “the detailed consideration it deserves”.

Only 12 countries, including Canada, Switzerland and New Zealand have positive adequacy decisions from the EU. The US regime was deemed partially adequate, but these decisions have been thrown out twice by the European court of justice. 

“The UK must also now move to complete the development of its own international data transfer regime in order to allow companies in the UK not just to exchange data with the EU, but also to be able to access opportunities across the world,” said Julian David, CEO of industry lobby group TechUK.

  Gov.UK:      Gov.UK:       BP Collins:      RTE:     CNBC:         Guardian: 

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