Data Protection of Digital Trade and Trade Agreements Concentrating on EU's Legal Development

Abstract

Along with the development of digital technology, digital forms of trade volumes have been enlarged dramatically. These trades inevitably contain transactions of personal data which arouse concerns over possible misuses. However, trade regulations under the World Trade Organization (WTO) regime and other Free Trade Agreements cannot fully prevent privacy infringement and provide proper remedy measures for individuals. This paper studies the long experiences and efforts of the European Union (EU) which has developed the legal foundations for protecting personal data while maintaining its free flow among countries. In particular, the study concentrates on how the efforts are reflected on the international agreements that the EU concluded and compares those agreements with other international trade regulations. What was interesting was that all the regulations in typical trade agreements naturally linked the data protection concern to the human rights which had long been dismissed when dealing with trade concerns. Most of the trade agreements, however, are limited in providing propriate remedy measures for each individual in that these agreements are based on inter-governmental relationships and advocate collective interests of domestic industries. Unlike other trade agreements, the Privacy Shield Principles, which was agreed between the EU and the U.S. following the nullification of previous Safe Harbor Agreement, is introduced as the most concrete and effective regulations for protecting personal data from companies that may infringe the agreement. As a legal area that does not have unified multilateral frame to regulate the digital trade concern, harmonizing the regulation would enhance market efficiency and predictability of participants. The EU-US Privacy Shield Principles that the two trade giants have already compromised can be model clauses for further harmonizing current fragmented international regulations.