On 25 June, the Legal Affairs Committee of the European Parliament published a draft opinion on the European
Commission's Communication 'Unleashing the Potential of Cloud Computing in
Europe'. The Committee's suggestions are summarised as follows:
'The Committee on Legal Affairs
calls on the Committee on Industry, Research and Energy, as the committee
responsible, to incorporate the following suggestions in its motion for a resolution:
1. Urges the Commission to take
action to further harmonise laws across the Member States in order to avoid
jurisdictional confusion and fragmentation and to improve the transparency of
the digital single market;
2. Calls on the Commission to
review other EU legislation to address gaps related to cloud computing; calls,
in particular, for the revision of the intellectual property rights regime, the
Unfair Commercial Practices Directive, the Unfair Contract Terms Directive and
the E-Commerce Directive, which are the most relevant pieces of EU legislation
that apply to cloud computing;
3. Calls on the Commission to
establish a clear legal framework in the field of copyright content in the
cloud, especially with regard to licensing regulations;
4. Stresses that, owing to
uncertainties regarding applicable law and jurisdiction, contracts are the main
tools for establishing relations between cloud providers and their customers, and
that there is therefore a clear need for common European guidelines in that
field;
5. Calls on the Commission to
work together with the Member States to develop European best practice models
for contracts, or ‘model contracts’, that will ensure complete transparency by
providing all terms and conditions in a very clear format;
6. Calls on the Commission to
develop, together with stakeholders, voluntary certification schemes for
provider security systems which would help to harmonise practices across cloud
providers and which would make clients more aware of what they should expect from
cloud service providers;
7. Stresses that, owing to
jurisdiction problems, European consumers are in practice unlikely to be able
to seek redress from cloud services providers in other jurisdictions; calls therefore,
on the Commission to provide adequate means for redress in the consumer services
area, since there is a strong imbalance of power between consumers and providers
of cloud computing;
8. Calls on the Commission to
ensure a speedy implementation of Alternative Dispute Resolution and Online
Dispute Resolution and to make sure that consumers are equipped with adequate
means of collective redress against security and privacy breaches as well as against
illegal contract provisions for cloud services.'
