The British government officially ratified on Thursday an agreement allowing the exchange of information data between the United Kingdom and the United States, which will enter into force on October 12 after the agreement concluded between Brussels and Washington.

This agreement stipulates the establishment of a “data bridge” with the United States “through a British extension” of the agreement between the European Union and the United States, according to a document published Thursday on the British government’s website.

The government stressed that the new system “will not undermine the level of data protection for data subjects in the United Kingdom.”

The United Kingdom and the United States announced in June in a statement that they had reached an initial commitment to this agreement, which will allow “licensed American companies (...) to receive British personal data.”

The EU-US data transfer agreement (“Data Privacy Framework”) adopted in July is a critical tool for the digital economy after European Court decisions invalidated previous frameworks.

The Privacy Shield agreement was canceled in 2020 before the UK effectively left the European Union in January 2021.

The "Privacy Shield" and the previous system were the subject of challenges filed by Austrian privacy activist Max Schrems in response to concerns about the protection of European Union data transferred to the United States, where it could be subject to surveillance by US intelligence services.

The activist had previously announced his desire to challenge the third agreement before the European Court of Justice, a procedure that will take several months.