Data Protection Package – The bare essentials appear to have been salvaged from the lobby storm

Following the final EU trilogue negotiations yesterday, where an agreement was reached on the proposal for a General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the Directive for Law Enforcement, and waiting for the provisional texts to be made public, EDRi would like to present the following statement:

In January 2012, the European Commission, following extensive consultations, published a draft Regulation and a Directive to regulate data protection in the EU. The initiative had three priorities – modernisation of the legal framework for the protection of personal data, harmonisation of the rules across the EU and maintaining existing levels of protection. A stated purpose was also to enhance individuals’ rights, and put them more in control of their personal information, as well as to make enforcement more effective – both are major failures of the current legislation.

Faced with possibly the world’s biggest ever lobbying onslaught, this agreement appears to have saved the essential elements of data protection in Europe. Sadly, there is little left of the initial ambition of the proposals. However, the devil is in the detail and the detail hasn’t been published yet.

said Joe McNamee, Executive Director of European Digital Rights.

We welcome the fact that the co-legislators have been able to reach an agreement. EDRi will wait for the public versions of the texts before publishing our more detailed statement shortly. The Civil Liberties Committee of the European Parliament will vote to adopt the package on 17 December.

For further comments please contact:
Joe McNamee
EDRi’s Executive Director
Tel. +32 (0) 2274 25 70
Email: