European Commission adopts new tools for safe exchanges of personal data
On June 4, 2021, the European Commission adopted two sets of highly anticipated modernized standard contractual clauses (SCCs). The validity of SSCs was put in doubt following the CJEU’s decision in the Schrems II case in July 2020, and the Commission issued its set of draft revised SCCs for public consultation in November. As expected, the Commission has now issued its finalized SCCs for the transfer of personal data to third countries (Third Country SCCs).
The Commission also adopted and released its SCCs for use between Controllers and Processors under Article 28 of the GDPR. The two new sets of SCCs are said to align more closely with the GDPR and will “offer more legal predictability to European businesses and help, in particular, SMEs to ensure compliance with requirements for safe data transfers, while allowing data to move freely across borders, without legal barriers.”
You can find European Commission’s press release here.
Case Law Digest 2021: Transfers of personal data to third countries
The European Data Protection Supervisor (‘EDPS’) published, on 10 June 2021, a case law digest on transfers of personal data to third countries. In particular, the EDPS noted that the aim of the case law digest is to clarify the structure of the analysis carried out by the Court of Justice of the European Union (‘CJEU’) in judgments concerning the transfer of personal data to third countries, highlighting the logic and steps followed and the jurisprudential acquis in relevant case law, as well as to allow readers to explore the key issues relating to international transfers of personal data. In addition, the case law digest answers a number of questions through analysis of key CJEU judgments, such as: