Which United States program was designed to enable organizations to bridge the gap between privacy laws and requirements of the United States and the European Union?
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Due to the lack of an adequate privacy law or protection at the federal level in the United States, European privacy regulations generally prohibit the exporting or sharing of PII from Europe with the United States.
Participation in the Safe Harbor program is voluntary on behalf of an organization, but it does require them to conform to specific requirements and policies that mirror those from the EU.
Thus, organizations can fulfill requirements for data sharing and export and possibly serve customers in the EU.
The program that was designed to enable organizations to bridge the gap between privacy laws and requirements of the United States and the European Union is the Safe Harbor program.
The Safe Harbor program was a framework that was established by the US Department of Commerce in 2000. It allowed US companies to transfer personal data from the European Union (EU) to the United States, which would otherwise be prohibited under EU data protection laws, as the EU has strict laws regarding data protection and privacy.
To participate in the Safe Harbor program, US companies had to self-certify that they would comply with the Safe Harbor privacy principles, which included requirements such as notice, choice, onward transfer, security, data integrity, access, and enforcement. Once a US company self-certified its compliance with these principles, it could receive personal data from the EU without violating EU privacy laws.
However, in 2015, the European Court of Justice (ECJ) invalidated the Safe Harbor framework, stating that it did not provide adequate protection for EU citizens' personal data. This decision was made in response to concerns about mass surveillance by US intelligence agencies, which were brought to light by the revelations made by Edward Snowden.
After the invalidation of the Safe Harbor framework, a new framework called the EU-US Privacy Shield was established to replace it. However, this framework was also invalidated by the ECJ in 2020, leaving companies to rely on alternative transfer mechanisms such as Standard Contractual Clauses or Binding Corporate Rules.