The EU Commission has adopted its proposal to make 2023 the European Year of Skills, following the announcement by President Ursula von der Leyen in her 2022 State of the Union address.
The year 2023 will be decisive in determining whether the EU Commission under Ursula von der Leyen can implement its digital policy goals before the next European elections. The related work programme is thus the last opportunity to get the digital decade underway in this legislative term. However, the focus of the EU Commission should be on implementing approved projects promptly as well as correspondingly closing open files.
On the positive side, the EU Commission is striving for a holistic approach to the topic of sustainability in its digital policy and has recognised the potential of digital technologies for climate protection. Also, we welcome the fact that the EU Commission wants to focus on, support and promote small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). At the same time, we wonder why SMEs have not found a sufficiently distinct valuation in the most recent legislative proposals. The mere intention to give special consideration to SMEs is not enough; the EU Commission must now follow up with action. Read more in the news section below.
eco Chair of the Board, Oliver Süme, explains the new Trans-Atlantic Data Privacy Framework in this issue. US President Joseph Biden has recently presented the transatlantic agreement for the legally secure transfer of personal data. eco welcomes that a solution for the data transfer from the EU to the US was introduced in Washington, which attempts to take account of the requirements of the European Court of Justice. In an interview, Dr Jens Eckhardt, specialist attorney for IT law at Derra, Meyer & Partner in Dusseldorf and board member of EuroCloud Deutschland, answers three questions on what this means for future data transfers to the US.
In the shadow of an impending energy crisis, eco published a joint position paper last week. eco calls for data centres to be recognised as system-relevant IT infrastructures, regardless of their size, and to be prioritised accordingly in the event of supply shortages. More on these topics can be found in this issue.
