Several representatives of companies and trade associations called on the European Parliament to improve the GDPR and Data Act simplification package, known as the ‘Digital Omnibus’ (see EUROPE 13755/4, 13897/15), notably by providing additional exceptions for the processing of personal data for scientific research purposes.
At a public hearing organised on Wednesday 1 July by the EPP group, the Director-General of the Association of Automotive Data Publishers (ADPA) called on the Commission to present a “specific” legislative proposal on vehicle data, covering embedded functions and resources, considering that the current legal framework is “insufficient” to enable the development of telematics services.
As regards the protection of trade secrets, the director of Siemens, Emir Demircan, said that “the real problem lies in the transfer of data to third parties”. “We provide data free of charge to anyone”, deplored the company representative, considering this situation “completely incomprehensible” for businesses.
Clotilde Hocquard, the representative of France Digitale, which represents digital startups, called for SaaS services to be excluded from the scope of the Data Act, in particular from the provisions relating to switching providers.
On behalf of the German press association MVFP, Alexander Nitz recalled that the GDPR does not allow consent to be collected “in a centralised manner”. “No one will give consent to services they are not even aware exist”, he argued.
The director responsible for privacy, AI and technology law at Zalando, Jan Wittrodt, defended data pseudonymisation, which he regards as “a particularly effective tool for strengthening the protection of individuals”. Concerning the processing of data for scientific purposes, he warned against requiring companies to share all of their know-how. “Beyond a certain point, knowledge-sharing no longer works, because it removes any possibility of a return on investment”, he stressed. As for consent requirements, he considered that “the debate is moving in the wrong direction”. In his view, once consent has been given, “data circulate without protection”, which is why greater emphasis should be placed on encryption.
The representative of MedTech Europe, Mirella Kavadaki, welcomed the fact that the proposal recognises that data processing for scientific purposes may also “serve commercial interests” and that “the processing of personal data linked to the development of artificial intelligence may be based on legitimate interest”, in a “controlled environment”. For her part, the representative of Medtronic, Chantal Vets, said that, in the health sector, research is “generally” conducted on the basis of pseudonymised data, and called for a specific exception to be provided for the processing of personal data intended for the development of artificial intelligence systems, so that such processing is not authorised only when those data are collected “incidentally”.
Lastly, the rapporteur on this file, Aura Salla (EPP, Finnish), recalled that the political groups had until 15 July to table their amendments. “Our next step, in the autumn, will be to examine those amendments, negotiate compromises and prepare the committee vote. Parliament has also requested an impact assessment, which we are expecting in the autumn”, she explained. (Original version in French by Ana Pisonero Hernández)