The European Commission has been accused of failing to implement its own cookie law – part of the revised e-Privacy Directive – with the vast majority of its own websites failing to ask visitors’ permission to install cookies.
The move comes as the UK Information Commissioner’s Office has revealed it has already received 84 complaints from Internet users since the EU legislation became enforceable on May 25.
And according to reports, none of the major EU sites – including those of the Article 29 Working Party, European Data Protection Supervisor, the European Parliament and the European Commission – are complying with their own laws.
Field Fisher Waterhouse partner and data protection expert Stewart Room said Europe may argue it is not bound by the new cookie rule as the rules for governing EU institutions were spun off from everyone else’s some years ago, But, he argued: “That is unlikely to impress anyone.”
Room added: “It’s very hard to see why the EU should be in a special category. The point is that it should comply with the spirit of the law, particularly when it is being so strident on the need for good data protection and when it is lecturing non-EU bodies, such as those in the US, on how the Internet should be run.”
A Commission spokesman for Digital Agenda said the executive body is pushing for changes to its online services, and plans to implement “do not track” in the near future.
Related stories
Top UK sites get cookie ultimatum
Govt sites to miss cookie deadline
90% of consumers back cookie law
DMA: Use cookie law to build trust
ICO tool to report cookie miscreants
