Digital Rights Across Borders: EU vs. US on Consumer Data Protection

Justice Matters

On today’s episode of Justice Matters co-host Mathias Risse speaks with Lex Zard, Technology and Human Rights Fellow at the Carr-Ryan Center, about recent developments concerning the Digital Markets Act (DMA) in the Europe Union in regulating consumer data protection, how that compares to US regulatory models, and what this means for human rights in the digital space.

Lex Zard is a legal scholar with expertise in the European Union digital policy regarding surveillance advertising. In 2024, Lex defended his thesis, 'Power & Dignity: The Ends of Online Behavioral Advertising', at Leiden University, where he also worked as a researcher and a teacher from 2018 to 2024 at eLaw—Center for Law and Digital Technologies. His research primarily addresses the boundaries of influencing humans in the online environment, including through interface design and artificial intelligence systems. Lex won the EURA Young Scholar award in 2019 for his work in these areas.

In this episode’s conversation Mathias and Lex discuss: the EU’s April 22nd decision to fine Meta two million dollars for violating the DMA, differences in digital regulatory approaches in the US and EU, the foundation of human dignity in the EU’s regulatory framework, whether the legal mechanisms in the EU and US see data protection as a human right or not, the consent or pay model, the global struggle between human rights and surveillance capitalism, Lex’s own research on online advertising governance, and his view of the transatlantic relationship.