Welcome to Update 5 in our series dedicated to keeping you informed about the Data Act and Data Governance Act. In today’s update, we would like to draw your attention to the data sharing obligations. 

The European Union Data Act introduces significant new obligations for data sharing across various sectors. Its goal is to foster innovation, promote competition, and ensure that data is used to benefit society. Here's a brief overview of the different data-sharing obligations under the EU Data Act.

B2C und B2B data sharing under Chapter II of the Data Act

According to Art. 4(1) of the Data Act, data holders must make data accessible for the user (can be any legal or natural person) of a connected product or related service. This is restricted to readily available data as well as the relevant metadata necessary to interpret and use that data. The data must be 

• accessible to the user without undue delay 
• same quality as available to the data holders
• easily, securely, free of charge, in a comprehensive, structured, commonly used and machine-readable format 
• where relevant and technically feasible, continuously and in real-time

The user can also request that the data holder shares the data directly with another entity or individual (third party), see Art. 5(1) of the Data Act.  

Mandatory B2B data sharing under Chapter III of the Data Act

The Data Act introduces obligations where a business as a data holder has a legal obligation under Art. 5(1) Data Act, EU law or member state law to make data available to another business. In particular, the Data Act sets up rules that the data sharing terms and conditions must be based on FRAND principles: 

• F = fair 
• R= reasonable 
• A = and 
• N = non-
• D = discriminatory

The sharing business may request a reasonable compensation for making the data available to the other business, see Art. 9(1) Data Act. 

B2G sharing obligation under Chapter V of the Data Act

Where data held by businesses can be essential for a task of public interest, the Data Act allows public sector bodies to access such data. The public sector bodies must present an exceptional need (such as responding to a public emergency). 

In Update 6, we will discuss the role and obligations of providers of data processing services.