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Articles by Theodore Christakis
No, Trump v. Slaughter does not undo the EU-US data-transfer redress mechanism
On 29 June 2026, in Trump v. Slaughter, the U.S. Supreme Court held that the statutory protection shielding the commissioners of the Federal Trade Commission from removal at will is incompatible with the separation of powers, and, in doing so, it overruled the 1935 case of Humphrey’s Executor. Within hours the decision was said to reach well beyond the FTC.
The Anthropic episode: Probably a security challenge in need of governance, certainly not Europe’s 'kill switch'
Editor's note The IAPP is policy neutral. We publish contributed opinion pieces to enable our members to hear a broad spectrum of views in our domains. On Friday 12 June 2026, the U.S. government directed Anthropic to cut off access by foreign nationals to its two most capable AI models, citing "jailbreaking" concerns. To give effect to the order, Anthropic disabled access to the two models for all customers.
“AI privilege” or why and how should our chats with AIs be legally protected?
Jun 11, 2026 03:00pm CET Webinar About: Join us for a moderated discussion on a question that is quickly moving from science fiction to subpoena practice: Should your conversations with an AI assistant be legally protected? Millions of people now ask chatbots questions they might hesitate to put in an email, say to a co-worker, or admit to a friend. They use artificial-intelligence tools to think through legal problems, medical fears, family conflicts, business plans, and private doubts.
The health AI agent rush: Five products in three months, and the privacy questions that got left behind
According to OpenAI, 230 million people ask ChatGPT health questions every week. Over 40 million do so every day. They describe symptoms, share test results, ask about drug interactions, confide fears about diagnoses they have not yet received. These conversations happen on every continent, in every language, under the same default privacy settings that govern a request to draft a birthday card. That is already remarkable. But something far more consequential is now underway.
New study maps the privacy gap in consumer AI — and proposes a fix | IAPP
Consumer chatbots have become the world's most trusted strangers. Every day, hundreds of millions of people confide health symptoms, legal strategies, financial anxieties, relationship crises and moments of acute emotional distress to systems that feel private but are not governed by anything resembling professional secrecy. The interface invites intimacy; the fine print reserves broad rights most users will never read. A new academic study, "You Trust Your Chatbot With Everything. Should You?
DeepSeek and the China data question: Direct collection, open source, and the limits of extraterritorial enforcement | IAPP
One year after DeepSeek's R1 model triggered what Marc Andreessen called "AI's Sputnik moment," the regulatory dust has begun to settle — and the picture that emerges carries important implications for cross-border data flows and the reach of European data protection enforcement. Together with Pankaj Raj, I have published a comprehensive study documenting the global regulatory reactions to DeepSeek over the past 12 months. The findings are sobering.
When Governments Pull the Plug
Since spring, Brussels has been buzzing with the worry that, if geopolitical winds shift, Washington might order U.S. hyperscalers to yank the plug on cloud and productivity suites running Europe’s daily business.
Data free flow with trust: current landscape, challenges and opportunities
ABSTRACT This article explores the efforts to achieve ‘data free flow with trust', highlighting concerns around foreign government access to personal data for national security and law enforcement. Governments increasingly seek data held by private firms, raising significant data protection challenges and leading to mistrust among jurisdictions and the implementation of data localization mandates.
Tools for Navigating the EU AI Act: (2) Visualisation Pyramid
The following article features a comprehensive visualization pyramid designed to illustrate the risk-based approach of the EU AI Act in a single, intuitive graphic.
The Conseil d’Etat finds the use of facial recognition by law enforcement agencies to support criminal investigations “strictly necessary” and proportional.
The Conseil d’Etat finds the use of facial recognition by law enforcement agencies to support criminal investigations “strictly necessary” and proportional. Autores: Théodore Christakis, Alexandre Lodie Localización: European review of digital administration & law, ISSN-e 2724-5969, Vol. 3, Nº. 1, 2022, págs. 159-166 Idioma: inglés Enlaces Texto completo (html) In this case the French supreme Administrative Court (Conseil d’Etat) was seized by a French NGO called ‘La Quadrature du Net’.
MAPPING THE USE OF FACIAL RECOGNITION IN PUBLIC SPACES IN EUROPE
By Theodore Christakis (project leader), Karine Bannelier, Claude Castelluccia, Daniel Le Métayer. This is the first ever detailed analysis of what is the most widespread way in which Facial Recognition is used in public (& private) spaces: to authorise access to a place or to a service.
Mapping the Use of Facial Recognition in Public Spaces in Europe - Part 2
By Theodore Christakis (project leader), Karine Bannelier, Claude Castelluccia, Daniel Le Métayer. The French DPA, CNIL, stressed that “the current debate on facial recognition is sometimes distorted by a poor grasp of this technology and how it works”. This 2nd of 6 Reports of our MAPFRE series provides a path to understanding with a classification table presenting in the most accessible way the different facial processing functionalities and applications used in public spaces.
Mapping the Use of Facial Recognition in Europe: Part 1
By Theodore Christakis (project leader), Karine Bannelier, Claude Castelluccia, Daniel Le Métayer. How to regulate the use of facial recognition in public spaces in Europe? This crucial debate has often been characterised by a lack of clarity and precision. Here is the first of 6 Reports from our big “MAPFRE” research project, a detailed independent study analysing the different ways in which FRT is being used and the related legal issues.
EU/US Adequacy Negotiations and the Redress Challenge: How to Create an Independent Authority with Effective Remedy Powers
EU/US Adequacy Negotiations and the Redress Challenge: How to Create an Independent Authority with Effective Remedy Powers 16 February 2022/ By Theodore Christakis, Kenneth Propp and Peter Swire / Can the U.S. Government create, by non-statutory means, an independent redress authority capable of providing an effective remedy for a European person who believes that her or his rights have been infringed by an intelligence service?
EU/US Adequacy Negotiations and the Redress Challenge: Whether a New U.S. Statute is Necessary to Produce an “Essentially Equivalent” Solution
EU/US Adequacy Negotiations and the Redress Challenge: Whether a New U.S. Statute is Necessary to Produce an “Essentially Equivalent” Solution 31 January 2022/ By Theodore Christakis, Kenneth Propp and Peter Swire Must the U.S. Congress change statutory law to solve the major issue of “redress” in the EU-US adequacy negotiations?
Towards OECD Principles for Government Access to Data
In December 2020, governments belonging to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) quietly embarked on an unprecedented exercise to formulate common principles governing their access, for national security and law enforcement purposes, to personal data held by the private sector.
Towards OECD Principles for Government Access to Data: Can Democracies Show the Way?
In December 2020, governments belonging to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) quietly embarked on an unprecedented exercise to formulate common principles governing their access, for national security and law enforcement purposes, to personal data held by the private sector.
Towards OECD Principles for Government Access to Data
Published by The Lawfare Institute in Cooperation With In December 2020, governments belonging to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) quietly embarked on an unprecedented exercise to formulate common principles governing their access, for national security and law enforcement purposes, to personal data held by the private sector.
Pre-Market Requirements, Prior Authorisation and Lex Specialis: Novelties and Logic in the Facial Recognition-Related Provisions of the Draft AI Regulation - European Law Blog
Pre-Market Requirements, Prior Authorisation and Lex Specialis: Novelties and Logic in the Facial Recognition-Related Provisions of the Draft AI Regulation 4 May 2021/ By Theodore Christakis and Mathias Becuywe The draft Artificial Intelligence Regulation proposed by the European Commission on 21 April 2021 was eagerly anticipated.
Squaring the Circle? International Surveillance, Underwater Cables and EU-US Adequacy Negotiations (Part 2)
Squaring the Circle? International Surveillance, Underwater Cables and EU-US Adequacy Negotiations (Part 2) 13 April 2021/ By Theodore Christakis / Part 2: On Double Standards and the Way Forward In Part 1 of this article, published yesterday here, I explained how the US government tries to exclude Executive Order 12333 and international surveillance from the scope of the EU/US adequacy negotiations and I presented four possible responses to the US arguments.
Squaring the Circle? International Surveillance, Underwater Cables and EU-US Adequacy Negotiations (Part 1)
Squaring the Circle?
How Europe’s Intelligence Services Aim to Avoid the EU’s Highest Court-and What It Means for the United States
As a result of last summer’s Schrems IIjudgment by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), the United States nowfinds itself forced to consider changes to its foreign surveillance law and practices in order to reestablish a stable basis for transatlantic transfers of personal data. Taking such steps may be the only way to persuade the EU that U.S. surveillance laws offer “essentially equivalent” protections for data to those prevailing in Europe, as EU data protection law requires.
How Europe’s Intelligence Services Aim to Avoid the EU’s Highest Court-and What It Means for the United States
As a result of last summer’s Schrems IIjudgment by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), the United States nowfinds itself forced to consider changes to its foreign surveillance law and practices in order to reestablish a stable basis for transatlantic transfers of personal data. Taking such steps may be the only way to persuade the EU that U.S. surveillance laws offer “essentially equivalent” protections for data to those prevailing in Europe, as EU data protection law requires.
“Schrems III”? First Thoughts on the EDPB post-Schrems II Recommendations on International Data Transfers (Part 3)
“Schrems III”? First Thoughts on the EDPB post-Schrems II Recommendations on International Data Transfers (Part 3) 17 November 2020/ By Theodore Christakis Three Scenarios for the Way Forward (and a Recommendation) Despite the very short available time, I have tried in Part 1 and Part 2 of this article to carefully review the EEGs and Supplementary Measures guidelines.
French White Paper on Internal Security Makes Several Proposals for the Use of Facial Recognition in France
A very important White Paper on Internal Security, published on November 16, 2020, by the French Ministry of the Interior, makes several proposals for the use of Facial Recognition Technology (FRT) by public authorities in France. The White Paper on Internal Security is a forward-looking document, which contains nearly 200 proposals, based on what it calls the “internal security challenges” of the 21st century. It succeeds to the previous “White Paper on Public Security”, published in 2011.
“Schrems III”? First Thoughts on the EDPB post-Schrems II Recommendations on International Data Transfers (Part 1)
“Schrems III”? First Thoughts on the EDPB post-Schrems II Recommendations on International Data Transfers (Part 1) 13 November 2020/ By Theodore Christakis No, there has been no new “Schrems” judgment from the CJEU. But the publication of the post-Schrems II “Recommendations” by the European Data Protection Board (EDPB) on November 11, 2020, is such a huge aftershock than one could mistake it for an entirely new earthquake shaking the international data transfer system.
After Schrems II : Uncertainties on the Legal Basis for Data Transfers and Constitutional Implications for Europe
After Schrems II : Uncertainties on the Legal Basis for Data Transfers and Constitutional Implications for Europe 21 July 2020/ By Theodore Christakis / CONTENTS I. Schrems II Places International Data Transfers in a Legal Limbo A. In Theory Schrems II Proposes a Holistic and Coherent Regime of Protection B. In Practice It’s Uncertainties Time: The Show Must Go On, But… How? II. Constitutional Implications for Greater Europe A. A Shakeup of the EU Equivalent Protection Mechanisms B.
First Decision Ever of a French Court Applying GDPR to Facial Recognition
While the case was still pending in the Administrative Court of Marseille, the French Data Protection Authority (CNIL) expressed in a notice published on October 29th, 2019, its great concerns in relation with such a system implementing facial recognition authentication systems for children for the purpose of controlling access to schools.
E-Evidence in a Nutshell: Developments in 2018, Relations with the Cloud Act and the Bumpy Road Ahead
The year 2018 was marked by some important legislative initiatives in the United States and the European Union reflecting a new approach concerning Law Enforcement Agents’ (LEAs) access to electronic evidence. These initiatives were motivated by the significant legal challenges that the globalization of criminal evidence is creating for LEAs: a 2018 report by the European Commission found that “more than half of all investigations involve a cross-border request to access [electronic] evidence”.
Reinventing Multilateral Cybersecurity Negotiation after the Failure of the UN GGE and Wannacry: The OECD Solution
While the failure of cyber security negotiations under the auspices of the UN GGE has created a huge void in international regulation, recent cyber-attacks with global reach have shown that action is more urgent than ever. Reflection on standards, good practices and norms should include private sector actors who are often the first victims of cyber-attacks.
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