Privacy, another Brexit benefit

An attack on our rights to privacy? Now they think they’re free from the EU, our security state, encourages the government to roll back those privacy rights that were underwritten by the EU treaties and the Human Rights Act. Here are some links and notes …

1. Stand Up for Privacy, by the ORG
2. https://www.openrightsgroup.org/campaign/immigration-exemption-campaign-page/
3. https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/TA-9-2021-0262_EN.pdf  – The adequate protection of personal data by the United Kingdom European Parliament resolution of 21 May 2021 on the adequate protection of personal data by the United Kingdom (2021/2594(RSP))

How important is “Adequacy”? Like so much of what we are creating, large companies will cope, smaller ones will not although if special model clauses go, then it will get even harder! i.e. large corporations will be able to both use standard model clauses (inter company) and binding corporate rules (intra-company), smaller companies will struggle.

Here’s a blog on Schrems III. I need to read this, it’s very “one the one hand and on the other”, but it focuses on state surveillance.

The Govt. seem to have slowed down on trying to sell the NHS records. Open Democracy, the key organisation in resiting this, have a series of articles on it.

I wrote this in early July, I have posted it here, because of its links.

The Commission flagged the agreement of a data adequacy ruling earlier in the year and finally agreed it with two days to go. The parliament is more sanguine. The EDPB is also more cautious, and we expect the CJEU to be so too. Whenever the CJEU has ruled, it has ruled in favour of citizens, whereas the ECtHR gives nation states significant leeway.

Both the Commission and Parliament made much of the fact that the UK was the first country ever to leave the acquis but may have underestimated the fact that the UK never fully implemented the ’95 directive, that UK courts weakened the legal protection  and that they took an expansive interpretation of member state powers defined in the GDPR Article 23 Restrictions. These are powers reserved for member states, not 3^rd countries and the UK’s immigration exception means that EU citizens in the UK are not afforded all the protections of the GDPR as envisaged by the EU.