EU Revises Model Contract Clauses for Data Transfers

The EU Data Protection Directive restricts transfers of personal data of EU residents to non-EU countries. A common approach for complying with this obligation is for the EU data transferor and the transferee abroad to adopt model contract clauses approved by the European Commission. The European Commission earlier this month adopted a decision approving a new set of model contract clauses for the transfer of personal data from a data controller to a foreign processor (controller-to-controller clauses were previously approved). The new clauses permit the foreign processor to re-transfer data to a sub-processor (the previous version did not permit this), and delete an arbitration provision from the previous version that had never been applied in practice.

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