Leading consumer and digital rights organizations across the globe welcome the recent announcement by the U.S. government, indicating that it is withdrawing support from controversial data flows and source code rules in the Joint Statement Initiative on e-commerce. We call on other governments to take this opportunity to reassess their own digital trade policy and better protect their citizens.

Trade agreements that are being negotiated, in different regions of the world, seek to include binding rules that require governments to allow free flow of data across borders without restrictions and to limit scrutiny of source code used in software. These international rules define strict conditions that governments have to respect when regulating the digital ecosystem. This could undermine the ability of governments to protect personal data and privacy of their citizens. It
could also make it very difficult for authorities to protect consumers from bias and discrimination, amongst other harms, of artificial intelligence systems.