Cyber Crime and Cyber Terrorism

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CHAPTER 14
Social media and Big Data
Congress on Strengthening Internet Information Protection 2012; Ministry of 
Industry and Information Technology Department Order, 2011; Greenleaf, 2013
).
In order to reduce such intrusions the draft version of the E.U. Proposal for a 
General Data Protection Regulation limited the disclosure to foreign authorities and 
provided that
“no judgment of a court or tribunal and no decision of an administrative authority 
of a third country requiring a controller or processor to disclose personal data 
shall be recognized or be enforceable in any manner, without prejudice to a mu-
tual assistance treaty or an international agreement in force between the request-
ing third country and the Union or a Member State”.
32
The draft also obliged controllers and processors to notify national supervisory 
authorities of any such requests and to obtain prior authorization for the transfer by the 
supervisory authority (See also 
European Parliament, 2013c; European Parliament, 
2013a; European Parliament, 2013b
).
33
These provisions had been dropped from the 
final version of the Commission’s Proposal on 25 January 2012, but have now been 
reintroduced by the European Parliament, as a reaction to the NSA case.
34
In addition to the Proposal for a General Data Protection Regulation, the above-
mentioned Proposal for a Directive on the protection of individuals with regard to 
the processing of personal data by competent authorities (PDPI) establishes some 
protection against a possible 
violation
of 
EU citizens
' 
privacy
.
The goal of this Directive is to ensure that “in a global society characterized by 
rapid technological change where information exchange knows no borders” the fun-
damental right to data protection is consistently protected.
35
 One of the main issues at 
E.U. level is the lack of harmonization across Member States’ data protection law and 
even more “in the context of all E.U. policies, including law enforcement and crime 
prevention as well as in our international relations” (
European Commission, 2010
). 
Whilst a directive may not have the same impact on harmonizing national regula-
tions currently in force in various Member States (For a critical view on this point see 
Cannataci, 2013
; See also 
Cannataci and Caruana, 2014
), it does in fact represent the 
first piece of legislation to have direct effect when compared to the previous attempts 
by way of Council of Europe Recommendation No. R (87)
36
and Framework Decision 
2008/977/JHA.
37
32 
See Art. 42 (1), Proposal for a General Data Protection Regulation, draft Version 56, November 29th, 2011.
33 
See Art. 42 (2), Proposal for a General Data Protection Regulation, draft Version 56, November 29th, 
2011. (“[The European Parliament] Regrets the fact that the Commission has dropped the former Article 42 
of the leaked version of the Data Protection Regulation; calls on the Commission to clarify why it decided to 
do so; calls on the Council to follow Parliament's approach and reinsert such a provision”).
34 
See Article 43a, PGDPR-LIBE_30-91. This provision does not clearly define the assignment of com-
petence between the National Supervisory Authority and the Judicial Authority with regard to the 
request of judicial cooperation.
35 
See PDPI, explanatory Memorandum, (SEC(2012) 72 final).
36 
Recommendation No. R (87) 15 regulating the use of personal data in the police sector.
37 
Framework Decision 2008/977/JHA on the protection of personal data processed in the framework of 
police and judicial cooperation in criminal matters, (2008), Official Journal L 350, pp. 60–71.

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