Tag: German DPAs

Opinion of the Article 29WP on the EU-U.S. Privacy Shield “leaked” by the German DPAs

12. April 2016

After the details of the draft of the new adequacy decision to carry out international data transfers between the EU and the U.S. have been released (“EU-U.S. Privacy Shield”), the Article 29 WP is expected to express its opinion on the proposed text within this week.

On the 6th and 7th April the German DPAs meet to discuss current privacy topics, among others about the EU-U.S. Privacy Shield. A link to the resolution related to this topic was uploaded in the webpages of each federal DPA. The link to the resolution was deleted afterwards. However, a permanent link to the resolution (in German) can be found under https://www.delegedata.de/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Beschluss_Mandat_Privacy_Shield.pdf.

The resolution of the German DPAs seems to refer to the current draft of the Article 29WP on the EU-U.S. Privacy Shield:

“Therefore, the WP29 is not yet in a position to confirm that the current draft adequacy decision does, indeed, ensure a level of protection that is essentially equivalent to that in the EU.”

This paragraph suggests that the European DPAs may not release a positive opinion on the EU-U.S. Privacy Shield.

Although the opinion of the Article 29 WP is not binding for the EU Commission, the Article 29 WP may initiate legal actions through the local DPAs against the adequacy decision if it is approved, as stated in paragraph 4 of the above mentioned resolution.