Europe’s new data law, explained

Industrial manufacturers in Europe sense the opportunity of big data — but Brussels is about to change the rules on how to tap into it.

European Union legislators struck a deal Tuesday evening on a landmark bill that aims to regulate who can access and share data generated by connected machines and devices, both on the work floor and at home.

The new law is a response to the untapped potential of industrial data in Europe, as 80 percent of machine or device-generated data is never used. The slow pace of its data economy is a threat to Europe’s industrial base — where the Continent still holds considerable sway — and data will be key for the deployment of artificial intelligence technologies in coming years.

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