EBay Argues for Unrestricted Data Flow in Trade Agreements During House Hearing

Unrestricted global data flows are critical to the health of e-commerce, said eBay Executive Director-Global Public Policy Lab Brian Bieron, testifying Sept. 17 before the House Subcommittee on Commerce, Manufacturing and Trade. "Government restrictions on where companies can process data "would greatly limit the many benefits of the Internet," Bieron said, in prepared remarks. "Imposing data localization requirements on Internet-enabled businesses is problematic from both an economic and security perspective." Bieron said the problem is not remote. "Localization barriers are actually proliferating most among some of the larger and more developed countries," he said. "G20 countries are responsible for 65 percent of the protectionist measures, and at the same time, they are also the countries which are the worst affected by protectionism." Subcommittee Chairman Lee Terry, R-Neb., said in his opening statement "the European Commission, for example, has argued that localization of data could be a way to promote domestic industry and create jobs" (here). The hearing was to discuss the role of cross-border data flows in the ongoing negotiations for the Trans-Pacific Partnership, Trade in Services Agreement, Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership and U.S.-EU safe harbor agreement, said a background memo (here). "I am hopeful that Congress can send a unified message to current and future trading partners that trade barriers will not be tolerated, and that we will protect our economic interest in data flows," Terry said.