This week, EU officials confirmed that a deal has been reached between the European Commission and US authorities, through which companies will be able to transfer personal customer data information from the EU to the US, and vice-versa.
The previous agreement was abandoned in 2020, as EU officials feared it left the personal data of EU citizens at risk.
Given the extensive business links between the two regions, having no EU-US data sharing agreement in place made things extremely difficult for digital brands. In May, Meta was fined $1.3 billion for transferring EU data to US servers, and the company said it would have to consider halting operations in Europe if the situation wasn’t rectified.
This new deal aims directly address the issue by offering more security and more control for EU citizens. If someone believes their data is being monitored by a third party, such as an intelligence agency, they will have the right to request that their data stop being shared.
Any such claims will be heard and deliberated by a specially established body, the Data Protection Review Court, which will be comprised of judges based in the US. If these judges find that a complainant’s data was compromised, they will have the power to remove that data to prevent any further privacy violations.
The deal will also benefit from a US executive order that was passed in 2022, which limits the power of US-based organisations to access and view EU user data.
According to the terms of the new EU-US data sharing framework, only relevant and appropriate customer data will be collected and transferred between regions.
However, detractors have claimed that the deal is too similar to those of the past and that more needs to be done to ensure the safety of all EU citizen user data. They have vowed to challenge the agreement in court.
Regardless, the news will be welcomed by affiliate marketers and digital brands, who will now be better placed to leverage connections between the US and EU and share customer data more freely.
Data privacy is an increasingly important issue in today’s digital world. Affiliate marketers and influencers must ensure they are also operating within the law and adhering to compliance regulations when it comes to handling sensitive customer information.
Regulatory red tape has made doing business between the US and the EU difficult for a number of years. With the new EU-US data sharing agreement, this should hopefully be a thing of the past and will offer affiliate marketers and digital brands the opportunity to expand their operations internationally.
