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US AND EU IN BREAKTHROUGH ON DATA PRIVACY



The U.S. and European Union have reached a tentative consensus on
their long-standing disagreement over the EU's data privacy
directive.  The finer details of the agreement remain to be
ironed out, but the EU has agreed to go along with the U.S. "safe
harbor" proposal and has found a policy of enforcement that it is
comfortable with.  "We've had a breakthrough on enforcement
issues with regard to data on EU subjects," said John Mogg, the
EU's internal market director-general.  The two sides have agreed
on standards that will be used to determine if a U.S. company is
eligible to be included on the safe harbor list, as well as on
the penalties for companies that fail to follow the privacy
rules.  U.S. companies could be prosecuted under criminal law for
not following the agreed-to privacy guidelines, said David Aaron,
U.S. undersecretary for electronic commerce.
(Financial Times, 23 Feb 2000)

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                             Paul Jones
   "We must protect our precious bodily fluids!" General Jack D Ripper
http://MetaLab.unc.edu/pjones/ at the Site Formerly Known As SunSITE.unc.edu
  pjones@MetaLab.unc.edu   voice: (919) 962-7600     fax: (919) 962-8071 
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