CoR Plenary (June 2022)

Seeking to unlock the socio-economic potential of data, while preserving European rights and values, the EU is breaking new ground with its data governance act. The first of a set of measures announced in the European Commission's strategy for data, the act is designed to facilitate voluntary data sharing across the EU and between sectors, by strengthening mechanisms that increase data availability and foster trust in intermediaries. During its April plenary session, the European Parliament is due to vote at first reading on the final text resulting from interinstitutional negotiations.

Data is a key pillar of the European digital economy. To unlock its potential, the European Commission aims to build a market for personal and non-personal data that fully respects European rules and values. While the volume of data is expected to increase dramatically in the coming years, data re-use is hampered by low trust in data-sharing, conflicting economic incentives and technological obstacles. As the first of a set of measures announced in the European strategy for data, the Commission put forward its proposed data governance act on 25 November 2020.

The way your institution deals with personal data has changed. These changes, introduced under the revised rules on data protection in the EU institutions, will affect you: when you process personal data as part of your work at an EU institution; when you draft legislative proposals, implementing or delegated acts (or international agreements) which might involve the processing of personal data; when your EU institution processes your own personal data, in relation to recruitment, appraisal or sick leave, for example.

With its "Digital Regulation" package, comprising the Data Act, the Digital Markets Act, the Digital Services Act and the Data Governance Act (hereinafter together the "Digital Regulation Acts"), the European Union is currently establishing various obligations to grant access to digital data. EU and Member State competition laws contain additional obligations of this sort. Beyond the questions of whether these obligations are justified or where adjustments to the access granting obligations as such seem appropriate, the transactions implementing them (hereinafter "Mandatory Data Access Transactions") require a sound legal framework.

On 21 April 2021, the European Commission presented the Artificial Intelligence Act. This Stanford Law School contribution lists the main points of the proposed regulatory framework for AI. The draft regulation seeks to codify the high standards of the EU trustworthy AI paradigm. It sets out core horizontal rules for the development, trade and use of AI-driven products, services and systems within the territory of the EU, that apply to all industries.