ABSTRACT
Existing laws were "insufficient to deal with concerns about the amount of information relating to individuals that was held by organizations in electronic form". The impetus for formal national data protection laws began in Germany, and has since spread. Some of the contrasts and similarities between US and EU data protection law include a recent project seeks to identify, elucidate, and promote areas of common interest between the United States and the EU in relation to data protection concerns. The project issued a report, which listed 10 areas for commonality and bridges between US and EU data protection. Referring to the need for bridges, the data protection bridges report states that there are indeed areas of commonality, but also differences, thus demonstrating a need for bridges and related research. There are differences between the US and the EU on data protection; however, there are also many similarities.
