Free and secure cross-border data flows are essential to the global economy. ICC promotes balanced data governance that protects rights and security while enabling responsible data movement.
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They enable everything from telemedicine and digital payments to global trade and daily business operations.
As both personal and non-personal data move across borders at unprecedented scale, trust has become a defining factor for resilient and inclusive growth.
Heightened concerns about privacy, security, human rights and economic competitiveness have driven governments to adopt divergent rules and, increasingly, mandate data localisation.
These fragmented approaches restrict cross-border data flows, raise compliance costs and limit the ability of businesses to operate, innovate and compete internationally.
By drawing on the expertise of our global business network, we inform governments on data governance and bring business perspectives to global forums. These include the UN Commission on Science and Technology for Development (CSTD), the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).
On behalf of business everywhere, ICC advocates for a balanced approach to data governance – one that supports open cross-border data flows, while also ensuring adequate privacy, security and intellectual property protections.
ICC Global Digital Economy Commission
Timea Suto, Global Policy Lead – Digital
Meni Anastasiadou, Global Policy Manager – Digital
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Cross-border data flows underpin the digital economy and modern trade, enabling businesses to innovate, reach new customers and increase productivity.
Yet trust in international data flows is being eroded by inconsistent national rules, lack of transparency and growing localisation mandates – which require data to be stored, processed or conducted within a country’s borders. These measures fragment digital markets, raise the cost of doing business and disproportionately harm small- and medium-sized enterprises that depend on predictable frameworks to compete. To empower global trade and inclusive growth, governments must support open cross-border data flows as a prerequisite, while ensuring strong privacy, security and intellectual property protections.
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Uncoordinated approaches to government access to company-held data can affect trust in the global digital ecosystem. Where access regimes are perceived as broad or insufficiently transparent, other jurisdictions may respond by introducing restrictions on cross-border data flows in order to safeguard individual rights and national interests. Over time, this can contribute to policy fragmentation, making it more challenging to sustain interoperable systems that both support economic activity and ensure robust protections for the data and privacy of individuals.
To address these challenges, governments must work together toward internationally aligned principles for data access. Effective privacy and data governance frameworks should balance the rights of individuals, the legitimate responsibilities of governments, and the practical requirements of operating secure and trusted digital services. Access regimes that are transparent, proportionate and interoperable, supported by due process, legal certainty and effective redress mechanisms can help governments pursue legitimate public policy objectives while maintaining trust between jurisdictions and facilitating responsible cross-border data flows.
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Non-personal data (NPD) – data that cannot be linked back to an identified or identifiable individual – is central to global competitiveness and innovation. Access to high-quality NPDs support companies to optimise supply chains, cut costs, forecast demand, train artificial intelligence systems and improve real-time logistics.
Yet, diverging national rules and emerging localisation measures risk fragmenting the potential of NPD. When governance frameworks lack clarity, companies –especially small- and medium-sized enterprises – face legal uncertainty, rising compliance costs and limited ability to share or re-use data across borders.
To fully unlock the value of NPD, governments must promote interoperability, encourage voluntary and secure data-sharing arrangements and avoid restrictive measures that undermine flows.
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Cross-border data flows are essential for efficient global supply chains, enabling real-time coordination and logistics across borders. ICC provides concrete recommendations to align policies with operational realities and keep trade flowing.
Explore the transformative power of non-personal data in this report. Understand how non-personal data plays a crucial role in addressing global challenges and discover how it fuels positive societal impacts. From tracking disease outbreaks to enhancing cross-border cybersecurity, the report outlines the landscape of non-personal data benefits while highlighting challenges hindering its full potential. It advocates for a balanced and targeted approach to cross-border data, promoting economic and societal well-being.
Lack of trust in cross-border data flows leads to uncertainty that may discourage the participation of individuals, businesses, and even governments in the global digital economy. Without clear parameters and rules around government access to personal data, including access across international borders, legal uncertainty will persist, likely leading to the proliferation of data localisation measures, which negatively impact the global digital economy. Achieving consensus on common principles for trusted government access to personal data held by the private sector will support the transfer of data between jurisdictions by commercial entities and result in positive economic and social impacts.
