Getting the EU data protection reform back on track

The proposal for a reform of EU data protection law was presented by the European Commission on 25. 01. 2012 and has thus been debated in the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers for well over 18 months. Judging by some public statements the view is that the deliberations are moving too slow (Speech by Viviane Reding, EU Justice Commissioner on Women and the Web – Why Data Protection and Diversity belong together, 15. 07. 2013). On the other hand the amount of amendments and counter-amendments under consideration in the European Parliament alone by some estimates now number well over 4.000. Which begs the question: What went wrong and how can the reform be brought back on track? Fundamentally speaking the reform presented by the European Commission in January 2012 was hobbled in two ways.