General Data Protection Regulation applies to jurisdiction European Economic Area
The General Data Protection Regulation (2016/679, "GDPR") is a Regulation in EU law on data protection and privacy in the EU and the European Economic Area (EEA). The GDPR is an important component of EU privacy law and of human rights law, in particular Article 8(1) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union. It also addresses the transfer of personal data outside the EU and EEA areas. The GDPR's primary aim is to enhance individuals' control and rights over their personal data and to simplify the regulatory environment for international business.  Superseding the Data Protection Directive 95/46/EC, the regulation contains provisions and requirements related to the processing of personal data of individuals, formally called "data subjects", who are located in the EEA, and applies to any enterprise—regardless of its location and the data subjects' citizenship or residence—that is processing the personal information of individuals inside the EEA.
The GDPR was adopted on 14 April 2016 and became enforceable beginning 25 May 2018. As the GDPR is a regulation, not a directive, it is directly binding and applicable, and provides flexibility for certain aspects of the regulation to be adjusted by individual member states.
The regulation became a model for many other laws across the world, including in Turkey, Mauritius, Chile, Japan, Brazil, South Korea, South Africa, Argentina and Kenya. As of 6 October 2022, the United Kingdom retains the law in identical form despite no longer being an EU member state. The California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), adopted on 28 June 2018, has many similarities with the GDPR.General provisions
The regulation applies if the data controller (an organisation that collects information about living people, whether they are in the EU or not), or processor (an organisation that processes data on behalf of a data controller like cloud service providers), or the data subject (person) is based in the EU. Under certain circumstances, the regulation also applies to organisations based outside the EU if they collect or process personal data of individuals located inside the EU. The regulation does not apply to the processing of data by a person for a "purely personal or household activity and thus with no connection to a professional or commercial activity." (Recital 18)
According to the European Commission, "Personal data is information that relates to an identified or identifiable individual. If you cannot directly identify an individual from that information, then you need to consider whether the individual is still identifiable. You should take into account the information you are processing together with all the means reasonably likely to be used by either you or any other person to identify that individual." The precise definitions of terms such as "personal data", "processing", "data subject", "controller", and "processor" are stated in Article 4 of the Regulation.The regulation does not purport to apply to the processing of personal data for national security activities or law enforcement of the EU; however, industry groups concerned about facing a potential conflict of laws have questioned whether Article 48 of the GDPR could be invoked to seek to prevent a data controller subject to a third country's laws from complying with a legal order from that country's law enforcement, judicial, or national security authorities to disclose to such authorities the personal data of an EU person, regardless of whether the data resides in or out of the EU. Article 48 states that any judgement of a court or tribunal and any decision of an administrative authority of a third country requiring a controller or processor to transfer or disclose personal data may not be recognised or enforceable in any manner unless based on an international agreement, like a mutual legal assistance treaty in force between the requesting third (non-EU) country and the EU or a member state. The data protection reform package also includes a separate Data Protection Directive for the police and criminal justice sector that provides rules on personal data exchanges at State level, Union level, and international levels.A single set of rules applies to all EU member states. Each member state establishes an independent supervisory authority (SA) to hear and investigate complaints, sanction administrative offences, etc. SAs in each member state co-operate with other SAs, providing mutual assistance and organising joint operations. If a business has multiple establishments in the EU, it must have a single SA as its "lead authority", based on the location of its "main establishment" where the main processing activities take place. The lead authority thus acts as a "one-stop shop" to supervise all the processing activities of that business throughout the EU (Articles 46–55 of the GDPR). A European Data Protection Board (EDPB) co-ordinates the SAs. EDPB thus replaces the Article 29 Data Protection Working Party. There are exceptions for data processed in an employment context or in national security that still might be subject to individual country regulations (Articles 2(2)(a) and 88 of the GDPR).Applicability outside of the European Union
The GDPR also applies to data controllers and processors outside of the European Economic Area (EEA) if they are engaged in the "offering of goods or services" (regardless of whether a payment is required) to data subjects within the EEA, or are monitoring the behaviour of data subjects within the EEA (Article 3(2)). The regulation applies regardless of where the processing takes place. This has been interpreted as intentionally giving GDPR extraterritorial jurisdiction for non-EU establishments if they are doing business with people located in the EU.EU Representative
Under Article 27, non-EU establishments subject to GDPR are obliged to have a designee within the European Union, an "EU Representative", to serve as a point of contact for their obligations under the regulation. The EU Representative is the Controller's or Processor's contact person vis-à-vis European privacy supervisors and data subjects, in all matters relating to processing, to ensure compliance with this GDPR. A natural (individual) or moral (corporation) person can play the role of an EU Representative. The non-EU establishment must issue a duly signed document (letter of accreditation) designating a given individual or company as its EU Representative. The said designation can only be given in writing.An establishment's failure to designate an EU Representative is considered ignorance of the regulation and relevant obligations, which itself is a violation of the GDPR subject to fines of up to €10 million or up to 2% of the annual worldwide turnover of the preceding financial year in case of an enterprise, whichever is greater. The intentional or negligent (willful blindness) character of the infringement (failure to designate an EU Representative) may rather constitute aggravating factors.An establishment does not need to name an EU Representative if they only engage in occasional processing that does not include, on a large scale, processing of special categories of data as referred to in Article 9(1) of GDPR or processing of personal data relating to criminal convictions and offences referred to in Article 10, and such processing is unlikely to result in a risk to the rights and freedoms of natural persons, taking into account the nature, context, scope and purposes of the processing. Non-EU public authorities and bodies are equally exempted.