BCRs and Tetra Pak has just got them approved in Sweden

An extremely interesting development considering the recent Schrems II decision and that Tetra Pak has US operations.

This is a first for the Swedish Data Protection Authority with BCRs. OneTrust has a good summary of the decision, etc., in English. Here is the decision in Swedish.

Now, there is much discussions on the legality of Binding Corporate Rules since Schrems II, after all surveillance in the U.S. is omnipresent, over which we have no control over here in the E.U., but in reality what this decision means is that the we need to be realistic, business must go on.

My take on the transfer of data is to dive into the potential risks to rights and freedoms of the natural person. If there are none, e.g. you are only transferring email address and name of the individual, and maybe they are adding business activities into a log, e.g. financial records. I find it difficult to really force myself to change an established business practice, especially now with coronavirus times, and many businesses are in survival mode, and many close to bankruptcy. If HR data is being transferred then this must change clearly.

I am, even as a privacy professional sceptical of all the fuss and hype there is on blocking all personal data transfers out of the EU to a country such as the U.S. (lacking adequacy decision now with Privacy Shield gone), because of Schrems II.

I guess if I wasn’t a small startup myself, serving small-medium businesses, I would think differently. But if this is all too complex, the SMB will do nothing, they have too much to lose, and when it happens it can go quick, money spent must be prioritised. For the SMB Schrems II is like double-dutch, all this legal speak, it’s out of their boundaries of business operations, and and the Data Protection Authorities get this, and are not normally targeting the small actors selling consulting, car repairs, chickens, or a pair of shoes, they are after the biggies.