Global, interoperable, secure, and open networks rely on the transfer and storage of data across different jurisdictions. These cross-border data flows can put pressure on legal systems designed for the pre-internet age. GNI has long been concerned about ways in which efforts to assert authority across borders and limit the free flow of data can impede privacy and freedom of expression and potentially undermine the open Internet.
GNI has engaged on a range of issues that raise important questions about when and how governments can and should assert authority over data. These include decisions through which authorities in one country seek to influence the content visible in other countries, as well as data localization laws that impede companies’ ability to transfer data freely across borders.
When it comes to law enforcement requests for data held by companies in other countries, GNI’s framework helps companies respond in ways that protect the privacy rights of their users. GNI also supports efforts to streamline and better resource the existing Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT) system, which allows law enforcement in one country to request evidence stored in other countries to prosecute crime. In 2015, GNI commissioned a report, “Data Beyond Borders: Mutual Legal Assistance in the Internet Age,” which set out key recommendations to update MLATs for the digital age. The report drew on the expertise of our multi-stakeholder membership and has been the basis of extensive advocacy directed at governments and international organizations.
GNI also believes it is important to consider complementary approaches that allow companies who hold data abroad to respond directly, in certain instances, to governments whose laws and procedures meet relevant international human rights standards. GNI provided views on the essential criteria that such an approach must meet in its submission to the European Commission and provided further context in our subsequent comment on the proposed European e-evidence regulation.
Read our latest work on jurisdictional assertions and limits below.