What are the Limits of Data Protection in the Network Society?

Abstract

Despite the CJEU decision in Scarlet Extended SA v Sabam the discussion whether an IP address constitutes personal data has not come to an end. Unfortunately many academics and institutions fail to either understand or take under consideration the technological environment when discussing the protection of data in the framework of new technologies. This is problematic because the popular view that is advocated cannot be seen as being complete and therefore not of satisfactory quality.The work aims at challenging this practice and argues that under the current legislative framework of the EU, the law does not reach its intended objectives when the underlying communication technologies are considered.The discussion is divided into three parts. Part 1 discusses exhaustively the underlying technology of the communication infrastructure for the purpose of presenting the reality in which privacy-related problems exist on the Internet. Particularly network addressing, http requests and referrals, and social networks are discussed in a substantively technical manner. Part II is a substantive application of the law to what is discussed in Part I as well as an identification of problems connected with the legal instruments. Particularly the scope of Directive 95/46 (Data Protection Directive) and of Directive 2002/58 (e-Privacy Directive) is assessed. Part III synthesizes Part I and Part II and evaluates the effectiveness of the law in this area and comments on the newly proposed General Data Protection Regulation.