Rome, ITALY – The Computer & Communications Industry Association (CCIA Europe) submitted comments to the Italian Competition Authority on Monday regarding its preliminary investigation A552 – Google – Obstacles to Data Portability, which was published in the Official Bulletin of the Authority on 18 July 2022 (press release in English). CCIA had applied to intervene in the administrative proceedings on 13 August 2022 and was admitted as an interested party on 8 September 2022.
In its comments, CCIA shared its views on an individual user’s right to data portability, as provided under Article 20 of the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), and the wider legal and economic framework under which it operates. CCIA Europe raised concerns that efforts by rivals to instrumentalise the GDPR in order to obtain unfettered access to user data could jeopardise user security and hamper long-term innovation in the wider digital economy.
In particular, CCIA drew attention to the far reaching, unintended, consequences that an interpretation – designed to benefit a single rival in this case – would have for the large number of companies to which the GDPR applies.