—

having regard to Article 173 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU), which concerns the competitiveness of EU industry and refers, inter alia, to actions aimed at fostering better exploitation of the industrial potential of innovation and technological development,

—

having regard to Article 114 TFEU,

—

having regard to Articles 2 and 16 TFEU,

—

having regard to the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union (the ‘Charter’),

—

having regard to the communication to the Commission of 21 October 2020 on an open source software strategy for 2020-2023 (C(2020)7149),

—

having regard to the Commission communication of 19 February 2020 entitled ‘A European strategy for data’ (COM(2020)0066) and the final report from the High-Level Expert Group on Business-to-Government Data Sharing entitled ‘Towards a European strategy on business-to-government data sharing for the public interest’,

—

having regard to the Commission’s inception impact assessment of 2 July 2020 entitled ‘Legislative framework of the governance of common European data spaces’,

—

having regard to the Commission communication of 17 April 2020 entitled ‘Guidance on Apps supporting the fight against COVID 19 pandemic in relation to data protection’ (1),

—

having regard to Commission Recommendation (EU) 2020/518 of 8 April 2020 on a common Union toolbox for the use of technology and data to combat and exit from the COVID-19 crisis, in particular concerning mobile applications and the use of anonymised mobility data (2),

—

having regard to Directive (EU) 2019/1024 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 June 2019 on open data and the re-use of public sector information (3) (Open Data Directive),

—

having regard to the Commission proposal of 6 June 2018 establishing the Digital Europe programme for the period 2021-2027 (COM(2018)0434),

—

having regard to the Commission communication of 25 April 2018 entitled ‘Towards a common European data space’ (COM(2018)0232) and its accompanying staff working document (SWD(2018)0125),

—

having regard to Commission Recommendation (EU) 2018/790 of 25 April 2018 on access to and preservation of scientific information (4),

—

having regard to the Commission communication of 10 May 2017 entitled ‘Mid-Term Review on the implementation of the Digital Single Market Strategy: A Connected Digital Single Market for All’ (COM(2017)0228) and its accompanying staff working document (SWD(2017)0155),

—

having regard to the Commission communication of 10 January 2017 entitled ‘Building a European Data Economy’ (COM(2017)0009) and its accompanying staff working document (SWD(2017)0002),

—

having regard to the Commission communication of 14 September 2016 entitled ‘Connectivity for a Competitive Digital Single Market — towards a European Gigabit Society’ (COM(2016)0587) and its accompanying staff working document (SWD(2016)0300),

—

having regard to the Commission communication of 19 April 2016 entitled ‘Digitising European Industry: Reaping the full benefits of a Digital Single Market’ (COM(2016)0180) and its accompanying staff working document (SWD(2016)0110),

—

having regard to the Commission communication of 19 April 2016 entitled ‘European Cloud Initiative — Building a competitive data and knowledge economy in Europe’ (COM(2016)0178) and its accompanying staff working documents (SWD(2016)0106 and SWD(2016)0107),

—

having regard to Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Directive 95/46/EC (General Data Protection Regulation) (5) (GDPR),

—

having regard to Regulation (EU) 2018/1807 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 14 November 2018 on a framework for the free flow of non-personal data in the European Union (6),

—

having regard to Directive (EU) 2016/680 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data by competent authorities for the purposes of the prevention, investigation, detection or prosecution of criminal offences or the execution of criminal penalties, and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Council Framework Decision 2008/977/JHA (7) (Law Enforcement Directive — LED),

—

having regard to the Commission communication of 6 May 2015 entitled ‘A Digital Single Market Strategy for Europe’ (COM(2015)0192) and its accompanying staff working document (SWD(2015)0100),

—

having regard to the Commission communication of 2 July 2014 entitled ‘Towards a thriving data-driven economy’ (COM(2014)0442) and its accompanying staff working document (SWD(2014)0214),

—

having regard to Directive 2010/40/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 7 July 2010 on the framework for the deployment of Intelligent Transport Systems in the field of road transport and for interfaces with other modes of transport (8) (ITS Directive) and the delegated acts thereof,

—

having regard to Directive 2002/58/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 12 July 2002 concerning the processing of personal data and the protection of privacy in the electronic communications sector (Directive on privacy and electronic communications) (9) (ePrivacy Directive),

—

having regard to the Joint European Roadmap towards lifting COVID-19 containment measures of 15 April 2020,

—

having regard to the Member States’ Joint Declaration on building the next generation cloud for businesses and the public sector in the EU of 15 October 2020,

—

having regard to the Council conclusions of 9 June 2020 on shaping Europe’s digital future (10),

—

having regard to the Council conclusions of 7 June 2019 on the future of a highly digitised Europe beyond 2020: Boosting digital and economic competitiveness across the Union and digital cohesion,

—

having regard to the judgment of the Court of Justice of the European Union of 16 July 2020 in case C-311/18 (Schrems II),

—

having regard to its resolution of 17 April 2020 on EU coordinated action to combat the COVID-19 pandemic and its consequences (11),

—

having regard to its resolution of 12 February 2019 on a comprehensive European industrial policy on artificial intelligence and robotics (12),

—

having regard to its resolution of 1 June 2017 on digitising European industry (13),

—

having regard to its resolution of 10 March 2016 entitled ‘Towards a thriving data-driven economy’ (14),

—

having regard to its resolution of 13 March 2018 on a European strategy on Cooperative Intelligent Transport Systems (15),

—

having regard to its resolution of 15 January 2019 on autonomous driving in European transport (16),

—

having regard to the opinion of the European Economic and Social Committee on the Commission communication entitled ‘Building a European Data Economy’ (17),

—

having regard to the findings of the annual Digital Economy and Society Index of 11 June 2020,

—

having regard to the report of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) of 5 June 2020 entitled ‘Building back better: a sustainable, resilient recovery after COVID-19’,

—

having regard to Rule 54 of its Rules of Procedure,

—

having regard to the opinions of the Committee on the Internal Market and Consumer Protection, the Committee on Transport and Tourism, the Committee on Legal Affairs, the Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs, the Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development and the Committee on Culture and Education,

—

having regard to the report of the Committee on Industry, Research and Energy (A9-0027/2021),

A.

whereas digitalisation continues to transform the economy, society and citizens’ daily lives, and whereas data, which is duplicated every 18 months, is at the heart of this transformation; whereas the volume of data stored worldwide is expected to increase from 33 zettabytes (ZB) in 2018 to 175 ZB in 2025 (18); whereas these processes will only accelerate in the future;

B.

whereas digitalisation not only presents an economic opportunity, it is also relevant for the security, geopolitical resilience and strategic autonomy of the Union;

C.

whereas the EU requires the availability of interoperable, flexible, scalable and reliable IT architecture that is capable of supporting the most innovative applications; whereas artificial intelligence (AI) is one of the strategic technologies for the 21st century, both globally and in Europe (19); whereas adequate infrastructure is also required in the EU, notably high-performance hardware to run applications and store data;

D.

whereas data is an essential resource for sustainable economic recovery, growth and quality job creation; whereas data-driven technologies could present an opportunity to reduce human exposure to harmful and hazardous working conditions and promote societal progress, and could play a key role in the transition to green and climate-neutral societies and in boosting the global competiveness of Europe and its companies;

E.

whereas the European strategy for data should be consistent with the SME and Industrial Strategies, as it will be instrumental, inter alia, to achieving industrial policy objectives and will be beneficial to European businesses, including SMEs, helping them to successfully face up to the digital transition; whereas there is still a gap between large businesses and SMEs in advanced digital technologies; whereas incentivising the use of data and increasing data access and availability, combined with more legal certainty, can provide a competitive advantage for micro enterprises, SMEs and start-ups to enable them to reap the benefits of the digital transition;

F.

whereas public sector and government-generated data at national and local level is a resource that can serve as a powerful engine for promoting economic growth and creating new jobs that can be harnessed in the development of AI systems and data analytics, contributing to a stronger, more competitive and more interconnected industry;

G.

whereas there are different initiatives in place to encourage female participation and diversity in ICT; whereas the gender gap continues to persist across all digital technology domains, with AI and cybersecurity among those fields with the largest gaps; whereas this gender gap has a concrete impact on the development of AI, which has predominantly been designed by men, thereby perpetuating and furthering stereotypes and bias;

H.

whereas in its communication on a European strategy for data, the Commission specifies that the environmental footprint of ICT is estimated to account for between 5 % and 9 % of global electricity use and more than 2 % of global greenhouse gas emissions; whereas the digital sector has significant potential to contribute to the reduction of global carbon emissions; whereas according to a 2018 study on AI by the Commission’s Joint Research Centre, data centres and data transmission could represent between 3 % and 4 % of the Union’s total electricity consumption; whereas the Commission expects a 28 % increase in data centre consumption between 2018 and 2030 (20); whereas 47 % of digital carbon emissions are due to consumer equipment such as computers, smartphones, tablets and other connected objects; whereas it is necessary to minimise the ecological footprint of digital technology, in particular the volume of electrical and electronic waste;

I.

whereas the Union must take urgent action to reap the benefits of data by building a competitive, innovation-friendly, ethically sustainable, human-centric, trustworthy and secure data society and economy that respects human rights, fundamental and labour rights, democracy and the rule of law and aims to build a new, open and inclusive knowledge economy, in cooperation with the education system and the cultural enterprises, which ensures the right to quality education and entrepreneurship, especially among the new generations, and promotes social innovation and new business models; whereas investments in skills in cloud and big data can help companies that have not yet embraced technology to turn their businesses around; whereas companies considered to be at the forefront of technology must remain constantly updated on recent innovations in order not to lose their competitive advantage;

J.

whereas cloud markets (i.e. Infrastructure, Platform and Software as a Service — IaaS, PaaS and SaaS) are characterised by a high degree of market concentration, which may put start-ups, SMEs and other European actors at a competitive disadvantage in the data economy; whereas the Commission should ensure competitive markets through interoperability, portability and open infrastructures, and remain vigilant about any potential abuses of market power by dominant actors;

K.

whereas the EU earth observation system — Copernicus — should serve as an example of the socio-economic benefits that a large amount of freely and openly available data can deliver for EU citizens and businesses;

L.

whereas all uses of personal and mixed industrial data should be consistent with the GDPR and the e-Privacy Directive; whereas according to Eurobarometer, 46 % of Europeans would like to take a more active role in controlling the use of their personal data, including health, energy consumption and shopping habits;

M.

whereas Article 8(1) of the Charter and Article 16(1) TFEU provide that everyone has the right to the protection of personal data concerning them;

N.

whereas the Charter also provides that everyone has the right to freedom of expression, including the freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers;

O.

whereas the processing of workers’ data has become increasingly complex; whereas in a growing number of contexts workers interact with technologies, applications, software, tracking devices, social media or in-vehicle devices that monitor their health, biomedical data, communications and interactions with others, as well as their level of engagement and concentration, or behaviours; whereas workers and trade unions should be more involved in the design of such data processing; whereas only Article 88 of the GDPR is devoted to employment;

P.

whereas business-to-business (B2B) and business-to-government (B2G) data sharing initiatives can serve to tackle societal and environmental challenges; whereas incentives for data sharing may include inter alia fair compensation, the exchange of best practices and public recognition programmes;

Q.

whereas proper enforcement should be pursued with particular regard to purpose limitation and data minimisation aspects; whereas the protection of privacy should remain a priority; whereas there is non-personal and public sector data that is consistent with Regulation (EU) 2018/1807 on the free flow of non-personal data and the Open Data Directive respectively;

R.

whereas health is a particularly sensitive sector for the processing of personal data and whereas no personal information concerning a patient’s health should be communicated without their full and informed consent; whereas it is particularly important in the field of health to guarantee a high standard of protection for the rights of individuals and to respect the principles of data limitation and minimisation;

S.

whereas a common European data strategy should provide benefits for the European transport and tourism sector and contribute to the transition towards a safe, sustainable and efficient transport system, while ensuring sufficient interoperability with other sectors;

T.

whereas data sharing in the transport sector is aimed at improving traffic management and thus the safety, sustainability, data minimisation and efficiency of both passenger and freight transport;

U.

whereas the Union has already begun taking steps in regulating how data should be used and stored in transport, through, inter alia, Regulation (EU) 2020/1056 on electronic freight transport information (21), Directive (EU) 2019/1936 on road infrastructure safety management (22), Regulation (EU) 2019/1239 establishing a European Maritime Single Window environment (23), and the proposal for a regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council amending Regulation (EU) 2015/757 in order to take appropriate account of the global data collection system for ship fuel oil consumption data (COM(2019)0038);

V.

whereas the Union should be an active global player in setting rules and standards based on its values;

W.

whereas at least 20 % of funding under the Recovery and Resilience Facility will be made available for digital infrastructure and capacities, which will deliver a boost to the Union’s digital transition and thus support the data economy;

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