Why the UN should be the world's lead privacy agency

While the protection of privacy constitutes by now a global concern, new technologies or methods of processing, such as big data, the Internet of Things, cloud computing, or smartphone applications, may easily drive to despair any legislator who attempts to apply local jurisdiction approaches on personal data processing that is by design addressed directly to individuals anywhere in the world and treats national borders as irrelevant.
Quite contrary to what is urgently needed, an entrenchment attitude may be identified even in data protection models devised today: The EU General Data Protection Regulation is intended to govern in a detailed and direct manner all personal data processing in the EU and place them under its strict conditions and procedures. Its extraterritorial effect is warranted not only through the adequacy criterion that is preserved more or less intact in its text but also through an ambitious approach on its scope, as recently reinforced by important CJEU case law.