Council of Ministers votes on latest draft of GDPR

In the past week, the EU national governments endorsed the latest draft of the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in a vote held by the Council of Ministers. It is now expected that the European Parliament will approve the GDPR within this week, along with a new Data Protection Directive for police and criminal justice authorities.

According to a press release of the Council of Ministers, which was published shortly after the vote last week, one of the main benefits of the Regulation is the fact that it provides for a single set of rules, which are valid across the EU and applicable both to European and non-European companies offering online services in the EU. Thus, the regulation provides the framework for increased cooperation between EU member states to ensure coherent application of the data protection rules.

The regulation follows a risk-based approach, which means that data controllers will be able to implement measures according to the risk involved in the data processing operations they perform. This will likely reduce administrative costs, as companies will not be forced to implement a “one-size-fits all“ solution.