Realising Europe's Digital Decade
In the past years, Europe has achieved more for citizens and businesses in the digital space than ever before.
We set a clear vision at the start of the mandate: ensure that our society benefits from technology and that innovation boosts our competitiveness, while minimising risks for citizens.
Empowering citizens and businesses to benefit from new technologies
Digital Services Act
We set out the basic principles for all digital companies in Europe, as well as clear rights for users. We defined the special responsibilities of large internet platforms on the content they promote and propagate – to help tackle hate speech and disinformation, for instance, and to protect minors. The Digital Services Act is showing its impact: big platforms are already taking steps to better protect minors, offering choices regarding their recommender systems, and labelling and providing access to ads.
Digital Markets Act
We are ensuring that major digital companies play by fair rules and that there is transparency and legal certainty for EU businesses. The EU has set a global milestone to regulate the economic power of digital “gatekeepers”, some of the largest digital global companies. They take a particularly important place in the internal market due to their size and role as gateway for businesses to reach their customers. The Act creates an opportunity for businesses to challenge gatekeepers by ensuring fair, open, and contestable digital markets.
The Artificial Intelligence Act
Even before services like ChatGPT became a mass phenomenon, we anticipated the impact of Artificial Intelligence on our lives. With the AI Act, the EU is becoming the first jurisdiction in the world to put up risk-based guardrails to ensure that the use of AI remains safe and human centred, while also boosting innovation in trustworthy AI.
Innovation-friendly and human-centric, it regulates AI where necessary to address risks to health, safety and fundamental rights and ensures a level playing field for innovation, without additional burden for most use cases.
We have set a goal of investing more than €1 billion per year in AI research and innovation, with the objective to attract more investment in AI per year over this decade. That goal was largely surpassed in 2022, when more than €3 billion of EU funding were mobilised.
Giving Europeans a safe and secure digital identity
The Digital Identity Wallet will allow all Europeans to have a secure digital identity that protects personal data and works in all Member States from the end of 2026. The wallet will offer a user-friendly public alternative to online identification, fully respect the choice of the user to share or not personal data and offer the highest degree of security. Very Large Online Platforms designated under the Digital Services Act will need to accept it to authenticate users.
Tapping the economic potential of data in a secure way
Data is the building block for many new products and services.
Access to an ever-growing quantity of data and the ability to use it are essential for
economic growth, competitiveness, innovation, and job creation.
Data Governance Act
in full application since September 2023, lays down requirements to increase trust in data intermediaries and strengthens data-sharing mechanisms. It enables the creation of common European data spaces in key sectors, including health and mobility, that facilitate the pooling and sharing of data in a controlled and secure way.
Data Act
will apply from September 2025. It creates the processes and structures to facilitate data sharing by companies, individuals, and the public sector. It will boost the EU's data economy by unlocking industrial data and foster a competitive and reliable European cloud market through easier switching and fair contract terms.
Increasing our independence in semiconductors with the
European Chips Act
Shortages of semiconductors have highlighted Europe's dependency on a limited number of non-EU suppliers. The European Chips Act, which entered into force in September 2023, strengthens Europe’s competitiveness and resilience by boosting manufacturing, stimulating the European design ecosystem, and supporting scale-up and innovation across the value chain.
Through the Chips Act, the European Union aims to double its share in the semiconductors global market to 20% by 2030. It has already triggered public and private investment plans worth over €100 billion, including:
€30 billion
investment announced by Intel for a mega fab site in Magdeburg
€12 billion
further announced by Intel to expand their fabs in Ireland
€5 billion
will be invested by Infineon in Dresden, to expand production
Improving Europeans’ digital skills and the access of new technologies by business
Under the Digital Decade Policy Programme, we track performance in four areas:
- citizens' digital skills; take-up of new technologies by businesses like AI
- data and cloud
- advancing the EU's connectivity, computing and data infrastructures
- making public services and administration available online
Concrete targets to be achieved by 2030 include:
80% of those aged 16-74 to have at least basic digital skills
100% to have access to their electronic health records
75% of EU companies to use Cloud, AI, or Big Data
Connectivity:
Gigabit for
everyone
Bolstering our cybersecurity and resilience to cyber threats
Cyber-attacks targeting critical infrastructure and aiming to exploit vulnerabilities
are proliferating in number and growing in complexity.
NIS2 Directive
In force since 2023, it expands cybersecurity rules to cover new sectors, such as telecoms providers, postal services, public administration, and healthcare. It improves the resilience and incident response capacities of public and private entities, and the EU as a whole.
Cyber Resilience Act
Agreed in December 2023, it improves the level of cybersecurity of digital products. It introduces cybersecurity requirements for all hardware and software available in the European market, from baby monitors, smart watches, and computer games to firewalls and routers.
EU Cyber Solidarity Act
Agreed politically by co-legislators in March 2024, it will improve the response to cyber threats across the EU. It includes measures to fortify cooperation within the EU, enhance threat detection and awareness, bolster the preparedness of critical entities, and reinforce crisis management and response capabilities.
Keeping our promise to Europe
Built with Shorthand