EU Digital Omnibus Proposals Face Privacy Watchdog Backlash Over GDPR Changes
European privacy watchdogs and digital rights advocates are pushing back against the European Commission’s proposed “Digital Omnibus” package, arguing that amendments billed as regulatory “streamlining” could weaken EU privacy protections and erode fundamental rights. Reported concerns focus on proposed changes to the GDPR, including narrowing the definition of personal data so that not all data that could potentially be linked to an identifiable person would qualify, alongside other adjustments intended to reduce compliance friction (e.g., reducing cookie banner requirements in some cases and simplifying multi-law breach notification processes).
Separately, UK officials told Parliament that legacy IT is impeding implementation of technical controls meant to prevent repeats of the Ministry of Defence’s highly sensitive Afghan data exposure, where roughly 19,000 resettlement applicants’ details were compromised via a CC instead of BCC email error. The government’s Information Security Review recommended shifting cross-government information sharing away from email/attachments and toward source-based sharing, but ministers and the chief data officer cited departmental system fragmentation as a barrier to rolling out attachment-blocking and safer data-transfer mechanisms at scale.
Timeline
Feb 12, 2026
EU privacy watchdogs urge lawmakers to reject key GDPR changes
The European Data Protection Board and European Data Protection Supervisor publicly pushed back on the package, warning that narrowing the GDPR definition of personal data and limiting right-of-access protections could weaken fundamental rights. They also questioned the value of the proposed AI-related legitimate-interest wording while supporting some breach-notification simplifications.
Feb 12, 2026
European Commission proposes the Digital Omnibus package
The European Commission put forward its "Digital Omnibus" package to streamline compliance across EU tech rules and boost competitiveness. The proposal included changes affecting GDPR definitions, data-subject access rights, AI-related legitimate-interest language, and breach notification requirements.
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