The Chair of the Committee of Convention 108, Ms Beatriz de Anchorena, participated in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) Ministerial discussions 2025 on digital cooperation entitled “Leading the Way Towards Resilient, Inclusive, and Sustainable Prosperity Through Rules-Based Trade, Investment and Innovation”. She reaffirmed the relevance of Convention 108+ and its alignment with the Data Free Flow with Trust (DFFT) principle.

The Chair also emphasised that strengthening trust and confidence in the Convention and other long-standing data protection frameworks is essential to ensuring effective cross-border data protection. In particular, Ms de Anchorena stressed the importance of distinguishing legitimate data protection rules from broader data localization measures, noting that data protection authorities play a key role in encouraging innovation and supporting the digital ecosystem.

Fostering multi-stakeholder cooperation at all levels remains essential to achieving the goals of Convention 108+: protecting individuals and enabling the free flow of data.

Finally, Ms de Anchorena underlined the strong synergies between the Council of Europe’s data protection initiatives and those of other Council committees and international bodies, particularly in areas such as artificial intelligence, child protection, and internet governance.

Link to the webpage of the OECD Ministerial Council Meeting 2025