The GDPR or General Data Protection Regulation creates a harmonised set of rules applicable to all personal data processing by organisations (public or private, regardless of their size) established in the European Economic Area (EEA) or targeting individuals in the EU. The primary objective of GDPR is to ensure that personal data enjoys the same high standard of protection everywhere in the EEA, increasing legal certainty for both individuals and organisations processing data, and offering a high degree of protection for individuals.
The regulation entered into force on 24 May 2016 and applies since 25 May 2018.
How can I apply for the European Data Protection Seal?
Controllers should formally submit their EU-wide certification criteria to:
the competent data protection authority (DPA) in the EEA country where the scheme owners have their headquarters;
the competent data protection authority (DPA) in the EEA country where a certification body operating the certification mechanism have their headquarters, considering the member state in which the most certificates are likely to be issued.
How can my processing operations or my organisation become GDPR certified?
Under the GDPR, certification is conducted by national certification bodies or by the competent national data protection authorities (Art. 42(5) GDPR).
For further information, we recommend contacting the relevant national DPA for your organisation. You can find a overview of all EEA DPAs here.
My organisation would like to become a certification body, how can we become accredited?
Certification bodies are accredited by the national data protection authorities (DPA) or by the national accreditation body (named in accordance with Regulation 17065/2012). For further information regarding certification bodies, we recommend contacting the national DPA in your country. You can find an overview of all EEA DPAs here.
The EDPB website also has two RSS feeds, which you can subscribe to for automatic updates on EDPB news and the EDPB’s latest publications.
Where can I find documents adopted by the Article 29 Working Party?
The archived documents adopted by the Article 29 Working Party (1997-2016) are available on the website of the European Commission here: WP29 archive.
Should you experience any difficulty accessing WP29 documents, we recommend contacting the European Commission's DG Justice. The European Commission provided the Secretariat for the Article 29 Working Party and was responsible for all its publications.
You can contact them by filling out the following form
I think my data protection rights have been violated, what can I do?
If you believe your data protection rights have been violated you can contact the organisation holding your data, contact your national data protection authority (DPA), or go to a national court.
DPAs can conduct investigations and impose sanctions where necessary. You can find the contact details for all EEA DPAs here.
What happens after a public consultation is closed?
Once a public consultation is closed, all contributions to the public consultation are reviewed and, where necessary, the guidelines may be adapted. Once this process has been completed, the guidelines will be up for final adoption at a subsequent EDPB plenary.
I submitted feedback to a public consultation, but I cannot see my comments on the public consultation page. How do I know that my feedback was received by the EDPB?
All comments submitted are screened and reviewed manually before being displayed on our website. There should have been a visual confirmation after submitting your comments on our website.
In any case, please allow for some time before your comments are published.