The EU-US Data Privacy Framework Requires a Functional PCLOB
A Trump administration move to gut a key oversight body meant to guarantee European data rights in the United States could endanger the legal basis underpinning commercial data flows across the Atlantic.
The Trump administration reportedly ordered three Democratic members of the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board to step down – a move that would deny the board the minimum of three board members it needs to establish a quorum.
The board is charged with overseeing U.S. surveillance practices. It is charged by the EU-US Trans-Atlantic Data Privacy Framework with ensuring that any European complaints about data misuse are addressed in a timely manner by the federal government and ensuring intelligence community is abiding by restraints placed on it during the Biden administration meant to ensure Europeans greater levels of privacy (see: President Biden to Sign Order for Trans-Atlantic Data Flows).
Europe adopted the framework in 2023 after nearly two years of negotiations between Brussels and Washington. At stake were digital data flows underpinning trade and investment between the U.S. and Europe, a relationship the federal government has said is worth $7.1 trillion. The framework permits U.S. companies operating in Europe to transfer and process data of European Union citizens in the U.S. (see: European Commission Adopts EU-US Data Privacy Framework).
European experts worry gutting the PCLOB board will erode privacy assurances guaranteed by the framework, putting it framework on every further shaky legal ground. The framework has already been challenged by activists who contend it doesn’t do enough to shield European data from American spying.
“The European Commission relies on executive guarantees, including the PCLOB to find that the U.S. is essentially equivalent,” Austrian rights group None of Your Business said. “If the PCLOB is not operational, many other elements will gradually implode.”
Disrupting this framework “would endanger data flows that are vital to trans-Atlantic trade and to businesses and consumers in both the U.S. and Europe,” tech policy experts Cameron Kerry and Shane Tews wrote.