The US and the European Union (EU) have a preliminary agreement over the storing of European data on US soil. It was announced by President Biden and EU President Ursula von der Leyen, speaking on Friday March 25. If successful, the data agreement would resolve a significant point of contention in US-EU relations since a previous deal regulating trans-Atlantic data flows—Privacy Shield—was deemed illegal by the EU’s top court in 2020. It ruled that the US did not provide EU citizens effective means to challenge US government surveillance of their data.
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Framework underscores “shared commitment to privacy”
While neither President Biden nor President von der Leyen provided details on how the new agreement would work and withstand legal challenges, the US President said that the “framework underscores our shared commitment to privacy, to data protection and to the rule of law” and would allow EU authorities “to once again authorize trans-Atlantic data flows that help facilitate $7.1 trillion in economic relations with the EU.”