Tech Commissioner Henna Virkkunen has reaffirmed the existing timeline for implementing the Data Act, a previously agreed law which regulates data sharing by connected devices, passing over indusattempt pleas for a two year delay.
The EU Data Act regulates the access and utilize of non-personal – typically industrial – data generated by connected devices, such as smart home appliances. But a number of indusattempt players have raised concerns it could harm innovation.
The Act became law under the last mandate and is supposed to enter into force on 12 September. Ahead of that, in August – amid the current Commission’s push to simplify EU legislation – several tech companies, including SAP, Siemens, Schneider Electric, tech lobby Digital Europe, and eight national lobby associations – called for a two-year pautilize.
They also inquireed the Commission to include a review of the law in its upcoming “digital omnibus” which is set to streamline existing tech laws later this year – claiming that applying the Act could throw a spanner in the works of “data-driven innovation” and AI development.
Replying to their concerns in a letter addressed to Green MEP Damian Boeselager, who was one of the Parliament’s nereceivediators for the Data Act, Virkkunen wrote that she “remains fully committed to ensuring a smooth and effective rollout of the Data Act in view of its enattempt into application on 12 September”.
In a LinkedIn post on Virkkunen’s letter, Boeselager stated he interpreted her reply as support for the Act. But he also urged the Commission not to give in to lobbying efforts to weaken it, declareing large manufacturers “wanted to utilize the simplification agfinisha (“digital omnibus”) to shift the balance we found”.
(nl)
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