Online Personal Data Processing and EU Data Protection Reform. CEPS Task Force Report, April 2013

This report sheds light on the fundamental questions and underlying tensions between current policy objectives, compliance strategies and global trends in online personal data processing, assessing the existing and future framework in terms of effective regulation and public policy. Based on the discussions among the members of the CEPS Digital Forum and independent research carried out by the rapporteurs, policy conclusions are derived with the aim of making EU data protection policy more fit for purpose in today’s online technological context. This report constructively engages with the EU data protection framework, but does not provide a textual analysis of the EU data protection reform proposal as such

Vulnerable Users’ Perceptions of Transport Technologies

As the global population continues to grow, age and urbanize, it is vital to provide accessible transport so that neither ageing nor disability constitute barriers to social inclusion. While technology can enhance urban access, there is a need to study the ways by which transport technologies - real-time information, pedestrian navigation, surveillance, and road pricing - could be more effectively adopted by users. The reason for this is that some people, and particularly vulnerable populations, are still likely to reluctantly use (or even avoid using) technologies perceived as 'unknown' and 'complicated'. Based on evidence from British and Swedish case studies on older people's perceptions of the aforementioned transport technologies, as well as on a Swedish case study of visually impaired people's perceptions, this article makes the case that technology is only one tool in a complex socio-technical system, and one which brings challenges. The authors also suggest that although vulnerable populations are not homogeneous when expressing attitudes towards transport technologies, their assessment criteria tend to be 'pro-social' as they usually consider that the societal benefits outweigh the personal benefits. Emphasising aspects linked to the technologies' pro-social potential or relevance to the individual user could increase acceptance

When mobility is not a choice Problematising asylum seekers’ secondary movements and their criminalisation in the EU. CEPS Paper in Liberty and Security in Europe No. 2019-11, December 2019

The notion of ‘secondary movements’ is commonly used to describe the mobility of third country nationals for the purpose of seeking international protection in an EU member state other than the one of first irregular entry according to the EU Dublin Regulation. Secondary movements are often identified as a major insecurity factor undermining the sustainability of the Schengen regime and the functioning of the EU Dublin system. Consequently, EU policies have focused on their ‘criminalisation’, as testified by the range of sanctions included in the 2016 CEAS reform package, and on a ‘policing’ approach, which has materialised in the expanded access to data stored in the EURODAC database by police authorities, and its future interconnection with other EU databases under the 2019 EU Interoperability Regulations. This Paper shows that the EU notion of secondary movements is flawed and must be reconsidered in any upcoming reform of the CEAS. The concept overlooks the fact that asylum seekers’ mobility may be non-voluntary and thus cannot be understood as a matter of ‘free choice’ or in terms of ‘preferences’ about the member state of destination. Such an understanding is based on the wrong assumption that asylum seekers’ decisions to move to a different EU country are illegitimate, as all EU member states are assumed to be ‘safe’ for people in need of international protectio

Response to Privacy as a Public Good

In the spirit of moving forward the theoretical and empirical scholarship on privacy as a public good, this response addresses four issues raised by Professors Fairfield and Engel’s article: first, their depiction of individuals in groups; second, suggestions for clarifying the concept of group; third, an explanation of why the platforms on which groups exist and interact needs more analysis; and finally, the question of what kind of government intervention might be necessary to protect privacy as a public good