AFM en DNB publiceren position paper over datatoegang

Following a discussion among stakeholders, the AFM and DNB have published a position paper on data access.
This Position Paper outlines the policy vision and priorities of the AFM and DNB regarding data access in the context of financial services. It addresses the growing importance of data access and its impact on financial services, including both traditional financial data and non-financial data like energy, BigTech, and IoT data. The paper discusses various initiatives globally and in the EU, such as GDPR and PSD2, which focus on data portability and regulated sharing of payment and account balance data. These policies could yield advantages for both consumers (data owners) and financial service providers (data users), but they also introduce risks within the financial sector.
Emphasising the need to capitalise on opportunities while mitigating drawbacks, the AFM and DNB highlight the importance of developing policies that leverage the benefits of increased data access while minimising potential disadvantages.
AFM and DNB’s interest in data access is motivated by its relevance to their mandates. The use of data for financial services impacts consumer interests, fair market operation, and the competitive structure of the financial sector. The broader policy context of the digital economy, with its opportunities for innovation and efficiency, as well as challenges around fair competition and privacy protection, is also highlighted.
This paper emphasizes the need for trusted, innovation-enabling, and equitable data access. It underscores the importance of obtaining data with the consent of data owners and using safeguards to ensure data use benefits them. The concept of equitable data access means applying similar rights and rules to different financial entities accessing data while potentially restricting access for entities that could cause harmful data concentration.
Both regulators advocate thus for prioritising actions that enable reliable, innovation-focused, and fair data access.
They have also prepared a statement that incorporates feedback from a roundtable discussion with market participants on data mobility, as well as written responses to a discussion document published in September 2022.
This Position Paper incorporates the use of privacy-enhancing technologies, aligns definitions with EU legislation, and addresses the balance between horizontal (cross-sectoral) and vertical (sector-specific) measures for data access. Infact, it highlights the need for cross-sectoral regulation of certain aspects related to data access, while certain implementation aspects elements can best be regulated on a per-sector basis.