EU’S DATA ACT
CONTEXT:
- Recently, the European Union (EU) agreed on a Data Act. It’s the fifth such legislation of EU.
ABOUT NEW DATA ACT :
- The Data Act was proposed as a way to determine how data generated from personal gadgets and public technology infrastructure should be accessed and handled by companies within the EU and around the world.
- The Act seeks to prevent Big Tech from collecting personal data of users.
- It also prevents personal data from treating them as the firms personal intellectual property.
- It will also allow individuals and small businesses to choose who can handle their personal and non- personal data.
- An individual can ask a firm to move his or her data to another firm.
NEED OF NEW DATA ACT:
- Currently, the full value of data in the European economy is not being reaped due to a number of factors.
- The Data Act will remove barriers to access data, for both private and public sector bodies.
- It will also preserve incentives to invest in data generation by ensuring a balanced control over the data for its creators.
- It will unlock the value of data generated by connected objects in Europe, one of the key areas for innovation in the coming decades.
- It will clarify who can create value from such data and under which conditions.
- The new rules will empower consumers and companies by giving them a say on what can be done with the data generated by their connected products.
EU’S GDPR Vs DATA ACT:
- The Data Act is fully consistent with and builds on General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) rules.
- This applies in particular to the right to data portability that allows data subjects to move their data between controllers who offer competing services.
- Under the GDPR, this right is limited to personal data processed on certain legal bases and where technically feasible.
- The Data Act will enhance this right for connected products so that consumers can access and port any data generated by the product, both personal and non-personal.
- As a result of its provisions on data access and use and interoperability, the Data Act will contribute to more data being available, also for and within the sectoral data spaces.
SYLLABUS: PRELIMS, CURRENT AFFAIRS