Record fine for Facebook + Agricultural emissions + CRMA

SAP CEO Christian Klein is busy writing letters to Margrethe Vestager these days. Sometimes in cooperation with the trade association Digitaleurope, most recently together with 60 CEOs from the European Round Table for Industry (ERT). Their concern: The Data Act, which is supposed to be the basis for flourishing data traffic in the EU, could undermine Europe’s competitiveness. There is not much time left. Under the Swedish Council Presidency, the dossier is to be completed by the end of June.

Today, Tuesday, the second trilogue is scheduled at the political level. The topic will be the obligation of companies to share data with the state (B2G data sharing). At first, this doesn’t sound so dramatic. Until now, companies have also been obliged to make certain data available to the state. And companies largely accept the idea of handing over data in emergency situations.

However, they fear that the wording in the Data Act will be so broad that it will remain unclear what data (personal or not?) and in what form (anonymized or not?) they must release – or, for example, may release at all under the General Data Protection Regulation. They also fear the effort and costs involved.

In politics, there are concerns that a too far-reaching obligation to hand over data could be disadvantageous on an international level. How are European companies operating abroad supposed to defend themselves against the handover of certain data to other countries – such as China – if they are obliged to do so in the EU?

There is another issue that worries corporate CEOs: they fear for their trade secrets. The Commission wanted to prevent companies from being able to refuse to hand over data on the grounds of trade secrets. In their drafts, the Council and Parliament have approached the companies, for whom the protection of trade secrets and intellectual property is a key concern. In the Council, Germany supports this approach, but finds little resonance with it. But nothing has been decided yet…

By the way, if you want to read not only the most important news from Brussels, but also stay up to date on all things Berlin: From now on, Berlin.Table, our late-night memo for the capital, will appear five times a week in German – from Sunday night to Thursday night. I hope you enjoy reading it.