Data Access

Business-to-government data access

Promote fair reliable and transparent, access to and use of (big) data sources held by private companies that can be valuable for innovative uses and the digital transformation of delivery of public services and better policymaking in a more flexible manner.

Business-to-business data access:

• Promote fairness in B2B data sharing contracts to further facilitate access to data and data sharing, which will benefit in particular start-ups and SMEs while ensuring compliance with EU competition rules as regards the data sharing.
  • Provide for a harmonious application of the conditions applicable in case sector-specific legislation mandates data access for the benefit of certain parties.
• Improve legal certainty on access and use of co-generated non-personal data, including data generated from the Internet of Things (IoT): opening more opportunities to generate value from data and to allow innovation through improved product design, to design additional services, but also to avoid lock-in effects.
• Review of the Database Directive, with the overall objective of increasing legal certainty for access to and trading in data. The review will aim to ensure that the application of the Directive, in particular the sui generis right does not pose an obstacle to the access and use of machine-generated data and facilitate the sharing of such data.
• These actions should be in full observance of the Trade Secrets Directive.

Improve data and application portability between cloud computing services in the whole data economy. This could include addressing contractual, technical and/or economic barriers, faced by business users, to portability between cloud services, resulting in a stronger position of business users and a more competitive and open European cloud market.

Improve technical standards for portability of data generated by individuals. The objective is to allow consumers to have more choice with respect to services around such objects, services that would depend on having access to certain data generated by these objects.

Jurisdictional conflicts: The objective is to reduce the risk of conflicts of laws and the legal uncertainty they generate for service providers, notably providers of cloud computing services, and establish clear safeguards and transparency for non-personal data of EU companies that may be subject to disproportionate foreign access requests. The objective is to clarify the position of data processing services subject to conflicting jurisdictional requirements for disclosure of data while respecting the EU’s international obligations in the WTO and bilateral trade agreements including in the areas of services, investment and intellectual property rights. 

Data Governance Act

The Data Governance Act was the first legislation tabled as part of the EU’s data strategy. The aim of the legislation is to help facilitate the transfer of data in the European Union and with third countries through neutral data intermediaries; free up repositories of public data; and enable citizens to donate their data for the public good e.g., for medical research, through acts of “data altruism”. The Data Governance Act entered into force on 23 June 2022.

For Bird & Bird data sharing and access obligations are a cornerstone of expertise within the Digital Rights & Assets Group. We have gathered regulatory and legal specialists in all relevant sectors across the world in the Global Data Access Expert Team. The team focuses on identifying the potential impact of data sharing regulations on your business and is ready to assist you with anticipating regulatory developments, advocacy and compliance throughout the entire legislative process, from draft to final adoption and implementation. The specialists will be able to advise on the impact of this for businesses coming from a variety of relevant angles, whether it is data protection, intellectual property or competition law.

The Digital Rights & Assets European Digital Strategy Developments tool gives you an instant oversight of the state of play. For advocacy with respect to data sharing, go to Regulatory & Public Affairs.