Czech Business Today
ePrivacy Regulation mustn’t be rushed, say European businesses
Although the discussion regarding the proposal of Regulation on Privacy and Electronic Communications (ePrivacy) started back in January 2017, when the Commission released the draft act, the EU institutions haven’t been able to find a satisfactory compromise that would suit all during the mandate of the Juncker Commission.
The European Parliament’s Civil Liberties Committee adopted its position in June 2017 and the whole Parliament gave it the green light later that year, but the discussions have since been blocked in the Council. The reason for that is that the Member States, as well as other stakeholders, have raised serious concerns regarding the proposal. European and also Czech businesses belong among those stakeholders. The main concern of businesses is that the proposal needs to be in line with two other major legislative acts, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the European Electronic Communications Code (EECC).
However, that isn’t the case with articles 6 and 8 of the proposal. Furthermore, article 6 should permit further processing of all types of personal data with appropriate safeguards, which would enable innovation and development of the Artificial Intelligence sector. Last but not least, the proposal should clarify what type of machine-to-machine (M2M) communication would fall under the scope of the regulation. The EU declared that it wants to be the leader in the sector of Artificial Intelligence, Industry 4.0, Internet of Things and Robotics. For that to happen, a robust legal framework that enables innovation while protecting users’ data and privacy needs to be created. Czech businesses call on the EU institutions to reassess the whole proposal, carry out a deep impact assessment and respond to all the concerns of the stakeholders.
