GDPR and the territorial scope

Answer:

Switzerland is not a country where the GDPR would be applicable by default however the GDPR has an extraterritorial component meaning that the EU GDPR is also applicable to entities established outside the EU if they offer goods or services to individuals in the Union, or if they monitor the behavior of individuals in the Union (i.e., profiling activities, tracking individuals’ activities on the internet, etc.).

This basically means that companies in Switzerland may be caught by the GDPR.

The key to understanding when EU GDPR is applicable is understanding the meaning of “in the Union.” The EU GDPR will only apply to personal data regarding individuals within the Union, while the nationality or habitual residence of those individuals is irrelevant. For example, a company based in the EU which is processing the data of Japanese individuals located in Japan will still need to comply with the EU GDPR. Consequently, the Japanese individuals will be benefiting from all rights according to the EU GDPR, even if these rights do not exist in their own nation’s laws.

When the data of EU citizens is processed outside of the EU by companies which are also outside the EU, then this is not considered to be “in the Union”. For example, the EU GDPR will not be applicable for a school which is based in the United States just because there is a possibility that one or several of its students would be EU citizens. In this case, the processing does not take place “in the Union,” nor is the individual “in the Union”.

If you want to find out more about the extraterritorial reach of the EU GDPR check out our EU GDPR Foundations Course (https://advisera.com/training/eu-gdpr-foundations-course//)