Transnational collective actions for cross-border data protection violations

Abstract

With the Cambridge Analytica/Facebook scandal, online surveillance clearly showed its negative effects. However, few individuals were able to recover any damages from the data protection violation that occurred. The EU General Data Protection Regulation contains legal tools to coordinate the interests of data subjects together in the case of infringements that occur across member states of the European Union, not only at the national level (Article 80), but potentially at the transnational level, as implied by Article 81. However, only a reform addressing the rules applicable to the standing of associations and non-governmental organisations in transnational claims as well as those concerning jurisdiction and international lis pendens would allow EU citizens to take full advantage of this opportunity.

Data protection beyond data rights: governing data production through collective intermediaries

“…Making co-creation desirable preserves economic and informational asymmetries between data subjects and data collectors. While rights-based data protection like the GDPR recognises individuals as co-creators of data, the capacity to make collective claims remains mostly limited to restitution following harm (Casarosa, 2020).…”

Redress for Dark Patterns Privacy Harms? A Case Study on Consent Interactions

“…77 GDPR), for example when targeted by a dark pattern practice. But most importantly, the procedure may also be started ex officio [22], without a complaint.…”

Governable spaces: a feminist agenda for platform policy

“…For instance, the European Union's General Data Protection Regulation places obligations on companies and establishes rights for individuals such as the "right of erasure. " Agency has been placed largely in the hands of company bureaucracies and zealous users, while the potential for collective action is only begin-ning to be explored (Casarosa, 2020). Yet individual users have only rarely been able to exercise their rights under the law; the essentially collective nature of platforms' data collection practices means that meaningful enforcement will depend on the kinds of voluntary associations among peers that Friedman turns to, the building blocks of feminist politics.…”