Data & Privacy
- Data Act
- Data Governance Act
- ePrivacy Directive
- GDPR
AI & Trust
- Artificial Intelligence Act
Cybersecurity
- Cybersecurity Act
- DORA
- NIS2
Digital Services & Media
- Digital Markets Act
- Digital Services Act
- European Media Freedom Act
Data Act
- Recitals
CHAPTER I
GENERAL PROVISIONSArticles 1 — 2
CHAPTER II
BUSINESS TO CONSUMER AND BUSINESS TO BUSINESS DATA SHARINGArticles 3 — 7
CHAPTER III
OBLIGATIONS FOR DATA HOLDERS OBLIGED TO MAKE DATA AVAILABLE PURSUANT TO UNION LAWArticles 8 — 12
CHAPTER IV
UNFAIR CONTRACTUAL TERMS RELATED TO DATA ACCESS AND USE BETWEEN ENTERPRISESArticles 13 — 13
CHAPTER V
MAKING DATA AVAILABLE TO PUBLIC SECTOR BODIES, THE COMMISSION, THE EUROPEAN CENTRAL BANK AND UNION BODIES ON THE BASIS OF AN EXCEPTIONAL NEEDArticles 14 — 22
CHAPTER VI
SWITCHING BETWEEN DATA PROCESSING SERVICESArticles 23 — 31
CHAPTER VII
UNLAWFUL INTERNATIONAL GOVERNMENTAL ACCESS AND TRANSFER OF NON-PERSONAL DATAArticles 32 — 32
CHAPTER VIII
INTEROPERABILITYArticles 33 — 36
CHAPTER IX
IMPLEMENTATION AND ENFORCEMENTArticles 37 — 42
CHAPTER X
SUI GENERIS RIGHT UNDER DIRECTIVE 96/9/ECArticles 43 — 43
CHAPTER XI
FINAL PROVISIONSArticles 44 — 50
DA Article 13. Unfair contractual terms unilaterally imposed on another enterprise
- 1.A contractual term concerning access to and the use of data or liability and remedies for the breach or the termination of data related obligations, which has been unilaterally imposed by an enterprise on another enterprise, shall not be binding on the latter enterprise if it is unfair.
- 2.A contractual term which reflects mandatory provisions of Union law, or provisions of Union law which would apply if the contractual terms did not regulate the matter, shall not be considered to be unfair.
- 3.A contractual term is unfair if it is of such a nature that its use grossly deviates from good commercial practice in data access and use, contrary to good faith and fair dealing.
- 4.In particular, a contractual term shall be unfair for the purposes of paragraph 3, if its object or effect is to:
- (a)exclude or limit the liability of the party that unilaterally imposed the term for intentional acts or gross negligence;
- (b)exclude the remedies available to the party upon whom the term has been unilaterally imposed in the case of non-performance of contractual obligations, or the liability of the party that unilaterally imposed the term in the case of a breach of those obligations;
- (c)give the party that unilaterally imposed the term the exclusive right to determine whether the data supplied are in conformity with the contract or to interpret any contractual term.
- 5.A contractual term shall be presumed to be unfair for the purposes of paragraph 3 if its object or effect is to:
- (a)inappropriately limit remedies in the case of non-performance of contractual obligations or liability in the case of a breach of those obligations, or extend the liability of the enterprise upon whom the term has been unilaterally imposed;
- (b)allow the party that unilaterally imposed the term to access and use the data of the other contracting party in a manner that is significantly detrimental to the legitimate interests of the other contracting party, in particular when such data contain commercially sensitive data or are protected by trade secrets or by intellectual property rights;
- (c)prevent the party upon whom the term has been unilaterally imposed from using the data provided or generated by that party during the period of the contract, or to limit the use of such data to the extent that that party is not entitled to use, capture, access or control such data or exploit the value of such data in an adequate manner;
- (d)prevent the party upon whom the term has been unilaterally imposed from terminating the agreement within a reasonable period;
- (e)prevent the party upon whom the term has been unilaterally imposed from obtaining a copy of the data provided or generated by that party during the period of the contract or within a reasonable period after the termination thereof;
- (f)enable the party that unilaterally imposed the term to terminate the contract at unreasonably short notice, taking into consideration any reasonable possibility of the other contracting party to switch to an alternative and comparable service and the financial detriment caused by such termination, except where there are serious grounds for so doing;
- (g)enable the party that unilaterally imposed the term to substantially change the price specified in the contract or any other substantive condition related to the nature, format, quality or quantity of the data to be shared, where no valid reason and no right of the other party to terminate the contract in the case of such a change is specified in the contract.
Point (g) of the first subparagraph shall not affect terms by which the party that unilaterally imposed the term reserves the right to unilaterally change the terms of a contract of an indeterminate duration, provided that the contract specified a valid reason for such unilateral changes, that the party that unilaterally imposed the term is required to provide the other contracting party with reasonable notice of any such intended change, and that the other contracting party is free to terminate the contract at no cost in the case of a change.
- 6.A contractual term shall be considered to be unilaterally imposed within the meaning of this Article if it has been supplied by one contracting party and the other contracting party has not been able to influence its content despite an attempt to negotiate it. The contracting party that supplied the contractual term bears the burden of proving that that term has not been unilaterally imposed. The contracting party that supplied the contested contractual term may not argue that the term is an unfair contractual term.
- 7.Where the unfair contractual term is severable from the remaining terms of the contract, those remaining terms shall be binding.
- 8.This Article does not apply to contractual terms defining the main subject matter of the contract or to the adequacy of the price, as against the data supplied in exchange.
- 9.The parties to a contract covered by paragraph 1 shall not exclude the application of this Article, derogate from it, or vary its effects.
Relevant Recitals for this Article
In contracts between a data holder and a consumer as user of a connected product or related service generating data, Union consumer law, in particular Directives 93/13/EEC and 2005/29/EC, applies to ensure that a consumer is not subject to unfair contractual terms. For the purposes of this Regulation, unfair contractual terms unilaterally imposed on an enterprise should not be binding on that enterprise.
Where one party is in a stronger bargaining position, there is a risk that that party could leverage such a position to the detriment of the other contracting party when negotiating access to data with the result that access to data is commercially less viable and sometimes economically prohibitive. Such contractual imbalances harm all enterprises without a meaningful ability to negotiate the conditions for access to data, and which may have no choice but to accept take-it-or-leave-it contractual terms. Therefore, unfair contractual terms regulating access to and the use of data, or liability and remedies for the breach or the termination of data related obligations, should not be binding on enterprises when those terms have been unilaterally imposed on those enterprises.
Rules on contractual terms should take into account the principle of contractual freedom as an essential concept in business-to-business relationships. Therefore, not all contractual terms should be subject to an unfairness test, but only those terms that are unilaterally imposed. This concerns take-it-or-leave-it situations where one party supplies a certain contractual term and the other enterprise cannot influence the content of that term despite an attempt to negotiate it. A contractual term that is simply provided by one party and accepted by the other enterprise or a term that is negotiated and subsequently agreed in an amended form between contracting parties should not be considered to have been unilaterally imposed.
Furthermore, the rules on unfair contractual terms should apply only to those elements of a contract that are related to making data available, that is contractual terms concerning access to and use of the data as well as liability or remedies for breach and termination of data related obligations. Other parts of the same contract, unrelated to making data available, should not be subject to the unfairness test laid down in this Regulation.
Criteria for identifying unfair contractual terms should be applied only to excessive contractual terms where a stronger bargaining position has been abused. The vast majority of contractual terms that are commercially more favourable to one party than to the other, including those that are normal in business-to-business contracts, are a normal expression of the principle of contractual freedom and continue to apply. For the purposes of this Regulation, grossly deviating from good commercial practice would include, inter alia, objectively impairing the ability of the party upon whom the term has been unilaterally imposed to protect its legitimate commercial interest in the data in question.
In order to ensure legal certainty, this Regulation establishes a list of clauses that are always considered unfair and a list of clauses that are presumed to be unfair. In the latter case, the enterprise that imposes the contractual term should be able to rebut the presumption of unfairness by demonstrating that the contractual term listed in this Regulation is not unfair in the specific case in question. If a contractual term is not included in the list of terms that are always considered unfair or that are presumed to be unfair, the general unfairness provision applies. In that regard, the terms listed as unfair contractual terms in this Regulation should serve as a yardstick to interpret the general unfairness provision. Finally, non-binding model contractual terms for business-to-business data sharing contracts to be developed and recommended by the Commission may also be helpful to commercial parties when negotiating contracts. If a contractual term is declared to be unfair, the contract concerned should continue to apply without that term, unless the unfair contractual term is not severable from the other terms of the contract.