Open Letter: The EU weakens the rules that safeguard people and the environment

Commission’s ‘simplification’ effort is dangerous deregulation in disguise

In an open letter published today, 9 September 2025, 470 civil society organisations, trade unions and public interest groups have raised alarm about the European Commission’s plans for a wave of drastic cuts to laws that protect labour and social rights, human rights, digital rights, and the environment.

The Commission touted the new “unprecedented simplification effort” as a flagship of their mandate, supposedly aimed at strengthening competitiveness and growth. However, nine months into its term, it’s clear that ‘simplification’ is just ‘deregulation’ in sheep’s clothing. The Commission’s insistence that this is about removing ‘superfluous red tape’ is not backed up by reality or historical precedence. They claim that trusting companies to do the right thing will make the bloc more “competitive” and boost “innovation” for EU companies. But plenty of sad affairs from EU history tell another story, including the financial crisis and Dieselgate.

EDRi is especially concerned about the EU’s digital rulebook – for which we have advocated for years – being stripped away.

Digital rights under threat – starting with the GDPR

Rules designed to ensure that we can live fair, just and healthy lives are already poorly-enforced. They’re now being withdrawn, weakened or gutted of meaning at a truly unprecedented rate. Regulations that protect us all from the excesses of corporate greed, that ensure we can breathe clean air and put a healthy meal on our family’s table are on the chopping block.

Moreover, a decade of digital rights progress is on the line. Earlier this year, we already warned against the reopening of the backbone of the EU digital rulebook – the General Data Protection Regulation. Doing so would mean people’s sensitive data could be processed without protections.

Whilst claiming to only be making ‘targeted revisions’ in the midcaps Omnibus, the European Commission is using the GDPR as an experiment to see whether the co-legislators will accept changes to the backbone of the digital rulebook. This risky strategy sets a dangerous precedent which illogically makes the protection of digital human rights contingent on the size of a company, instead of the limitation it places on our rights and freedoms. What’s more, in putting forward this proposal without an impact assessment – like with many other of the deregulatory Omnibuses – the Commission has failed to do their homework or meet even the most basic standards of good lawmaking.

While the contents of the forthcoming Digital package (Omnibus), slated for 10 December, are not yet known, we believe that the GDPR could once again fall victim to the mass slash being driven or supported by many EU lawmakers. The vital ePrivacy Directive – which needs to be strengthened, not watered down – is also rumoured to be in scope, which could reduce the already insufficient protections we have against online tracking methods, such as cookies.

Other digital laws at risk

Further attacks on rights-based rules such as the Artificial Intelligence (AI) Act, and the planned Digital Package, could undermine rules that protect all our digital lives against AI harms and surveillance from state and corporate actors. The Artificial Intelligence (AI) Act has not even been implemented nationally, and yet a wide range of industry players, and some lawmakers, are already trying to derail it. The massive push from industry to ‘stop the clock’ would mean delaying rules that protect us all from the most harmful and high-stakes use cases of AI – such as those in certain policing, migration or education contexts.

Big Tech CEOs and the Trump administration are also putting huge efforts into trying to discredit the EU’s platform laws, the Digital Services Act (DSA) and the Digital Markets Act (DMA), leading to immense pressure to deregulate these vital laws, and a risk that the European Commission might bow to this pressure and weaken its enforcement. Yet as evidence shows, the DSA and DMA are already taking some important steps such as protecting us from having our sensitive information used to target us while job hunting, stopping big platforms from locking out smaller rivals (denying us the choice to use services that respect our rights and autonomy), and requiring platforms to consider our privacy, safety and security by design. These laws will not fix everything that’s broken in today’s digital ecosystem, but by balancing free expression with tackling illegal content, the DSA takes an important stride in holding Big Tech to account, while the DMA curbs their ability to lock us in to their toxic services.

The EU’s deregulation agenda is also present in the migration and securitisation space, albeit in a more insidious way. The EU has a long history of depriving people on the move and third country nationals of their rights or of redress for violations – itself a very specific form of deregulation. Even as rules that protect people are being cut, dehumanising and punitive rules that treat human beings as security risks to be managed are one of the only areas not being cut – even though they should be.

Another way in which the internet as we know it is on the deregulation chopping block is in the space of ‘net neutrality’. Net neutrality is the principle, embedded in the Open Internet Regulation, which ensures that all internet traffic is treated equally. Yet once again, powerful industry lobbyists are claiming that these rules should be watered down, and with the forthcoming Digital Networks Act (DNA), the Commission seems to be entertaining the idea.

We need more protections, not fewer

The public interest organisations are calling on the EU and national lawmakers to protect and promote the rights enshrined in the EU Charter and international human rights law.

During times of geopolitical tensions, extreme inequality, climate crises, increasing surveillance and crimininalisation and democratic backsliding, we need these laws to remain strong so that people, planet and democracy can thrive. We urge lawmakers to remain steadfast in protecting these rules and giving them a fair chance to be implemented, enforced and interpreted, instead of risking undoing years of negotiations and progress (not to mention taxpayers’ money).

Read the open letter for a full list of civil society’s call to EU lawmakers.