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On September 30, 2018, the U.S., Mexico and Canada announced a
new trade agreement (the
"USMCA") aimed at replacing the North American Free Trade
Agreement. Notably, the USMCA's chapter on digital trade
recognizes "the economic and social benefits of protecting the
personal information of users of digital trade" and will
require the U.S., Canada and Mexico (the "Parties") to
each "adopt or maintain a legal framework that provides for
the protection of the personal information of the users[.]"
The frameworks should include key principles such as: limitations
on collection, choice, data quality, purpose specification, use
limitation, security safeguards, transparency, individual
participation and accountability.
Art. 19.8(6) Recognizing that the
Parties may take different legal approaches to protecting personal
information, each Party should encourage the development of
mechanisms to promote compatibility between these different
regimes. The Parties shall endeavor to exchange information on the
mechanisms applied in their jurisdictions and explore ways to
extend these or other suitable arrangements to promote
compatibility between them. The Parties recognize that the APEC
Cross-Border Privacy Rules system is a valid mechanism to
facilitate cross-border information transfers while protecting
personal information.
In addition, Article 19.14(1)(b) provides that "the Parties
shall endeavor to... cooperate and maintain a dialogue on the
promotion and development of mechanisms, including the APEC
Cross-Border Privacy Rules, that further global interoperability of
privacy regimes."
The APEC CBPRs were developed by the 21 APEC member
economies as a cross-border transfer mechanism and comprehensive
privacy program for private sector organizations to enable
the accountable free flow of data across the APEC region.
Organizations must be certified by a third-party APEC recognized
Accountability Agent to participate in this system. The CBPRs are
binding and enforceable against participating companies.
The USMCA must still pass the U.S. Congress, the Canadian
Parliament, and the Mexican Senate.
The content of this article is intended to provide a general
guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought
about your specific circumstances.
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The Employment & Benefits group is pleased to announce the publication of A Global Guide to Employee Data Privacy, the latest in our series of global guides.
According to a recent story published by The Register, the U.K. data privacy watchdog, the Information Commissioner's Office has issued a warning to the U.S.-based newspaper The Washington Post ...
In doing so, the Court made clear that the criminal acts of third parties who may breach a computer system do not alleviate the legal duty on a business to protect such information.
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