The EU is widely recognized as having one of the strongest data protection regimes in the world. The right of protection of personal data is codified in Article 8 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the EU. However, as with so much else, this regime has been cast into doubt by Brexit. Immediately after the results of the Brexit referendum, scholars pointed out that “data protection has the potential to be among the issues that “make” or “break” a possibly successful Brexit” (see this article by de Hert, Papakonstantinou) It is unclear what sort of political and legal solutions will be found for this problem.
The crux of the discussion can be summarized as the need to continue guaranteeing Data Flow. The question is how to fuel Data Exchange and Data Transfer between the UK and the EU since this Data Flow is the cornerstone for both private economic activities and (above all) for police and judicial cooperation. This will certainly require a general legal framework that guarantees the complex and increasingly refined system of legal protection of individuals concerning their personal information and their rights concerning these data.