The inter-institutional negotiations on the free flow of non-personal data are expected to begin soon. At the end of a brief vote, the European Parliament's internal market committee (IMCO) granted a negotiating mandate on Monday 4 June to Anna Maria Corazza Bildt (EPP, Sweden) by 28 votes, with 3 against. The main difficulty is expected to involve the question of whether to include public undertakings in the regulation's scope.
It should be recalled that the draft regulation presented in September 2017 aims to facilitate the free flow of non-personal data. It prohibits the unfair localisation of data, except for public security reasons.
The position of the Parliament in detail
The negotiating mandate, welcomed by DigitalEurope (which represents Google, amongst others) resumes the main guidelines in the Commission proposal. It prohibits localisation requirements, “unless, in exceptional circumstances and in respect of the proportionality principle, they are justified for imperative public security reasons”. It requires the member states to “inform” the Commission if any requirements are deemed justified.
MEPs also support the introduction of codes of conduct for data sharing, which cover good practices for changing providers and minimal information requirements. They also clarify the relationship between the future regulation and the one on general data protection (2016/679, GDPR), specifying that the former applies to non-personal data and the latter to personal data. In a recital, they also explain that although technological progress has helped to transform anonymised data into personal data, this kind of data should be processed as personal data.
In terms of the timeframe, the mandate calls on the Commission to publish guidelines on the relationship between the new regulation and the GDPR six months after the date of the publication of the new text. It also stipulates that it should be assessed three and a half years after this said publication.
Next stages
In this context, the inter-institutional negotiations could begin on 14 June if the European Parliament does not question the negotiating mandate during its plenary session on 11 June. According to a Council document, the second trialogue could take place on 20 June, the date when the Bulgarian Presidency has finished with the revised Council mandate. The main difficulty could involve the public undertakings, which Parliament would like to be included in the regulation, “including, without encroaching on directive 2014/24/EU, the context of public procurement”. (Original version in French by Sophie Petitjean)