Also known as: onward transfers · onward transferred · onward transferring · subsequent transfer
Written by attorneys · grounded in primary & secondary sources — see below
A principle requiring that an organization receiving personal data from the European Union may transfer that data to a third party only if the third party is bound by the same privacy protections.
Select any source to read its text and confirm it supports the definition.
EU-based retailer EuroMart transferred customer profiles to U.S. processor DataCore under Safe Harbor. DataCore later sent the same profiles to analytics firm Insight LLC. Insight had not signed the required privacy addendum. EuroMart was held liable for the onward transfer because Insight lacked equivalent protections.
Health app MedTrack received EU patient records and stored them with AWS under a Safe Harbor certification. AWS then routed backups to a non-certified affiliate in Asia. The affiliate's weaker safeguards violated the onward-transfer rule. MedTrack faced enforcement for failing to ensure the affiliate's compliance.
U.S. firm SafeList bought an EU mailing list from French company AdEU. SafeList resold the list to U.S. advertiser PromoCo without verifying PromoCo's privacy commitments. PromoCo misused the data. SafeList was sanctioned because the resale constituted an unprotected onward transfer.
The organization must confirm that the third party is subject to the same privacy protections that apply to the original recipient. This requirement prevents dilution of safeguards when data moves beyond the initial holder.
Supporting sources
Yes. The principle governs onward transfers of personal data that a U.S. organization first received from the European Union under the Safe Harbor framework.
Supporting sources
…the said report was obtained from several sources. First, by personally attending and taking notes of the said trial and the subsequent transfer of four of the six defendants to the Fulton County Jail, I obtained personal knowledge of the events that transpired during the trial of this action and the said transfer of the defendants.…