The Confederation of British Industry (CBI) has announced that
is working to produce a simplified version of the European
Commission’s standard contract clauses for use in agreements to
transfer personal data to non-EU countries, according to a report
by Legal Media Group.
The data protection rules in Europe require that all personal
data transferred to countries outside the Union should benefit from
"adequate protection". The EU recently prepared standard terms for
organisations to use to ensure that such protection is in place for
personal data transfers.
The EU’s standard contractual clauses were neither compulsory
for businesses, nor were they the only way of lawfully transferring
data to other countries. They merely added a new possibility to
those already existing under the Data Protection Directive.
However, the CBI’s decision to amend these standard clauses
follows criticism that the originals were confusing and vague. The
CBI hopes to have simplified versions of the standard clauses will
be finalised by the end of September.
