German authorities have recently expressed skepticism about cloud computing and the potential it has for breaking data protection laws.

According to the Information Law Group, there is no imminent danger of a European crackdown but legal experts are advising international companies to address the potential concerns in their planning and operations.

The controversy stems from Dr. Thilo Weichert, head of the data protection commission in the northernmost German state of Schleswig-Holstein. Weichert is calling for the abolition of the Safe Harbor framework and doubts the ability of companies to protect the rights of Europeans, who enjoy some of the strongest personal privacy laws in the world.

According to the Information Law Group, the Safe Harbor Framework was “developed jointly by the European Commission and the US Department of Commerce, under which American companies can publicly certify compliance with a standard set of Safe Harbor Privacy Principles approved by the European Commission and enforced by American regulators, predominantly the Federal Trade Commission.”

The concerns about data privacy are also felt across Europe. Most of the tension arise fro

via No Crackdown but Questions in Europe About Data Protection and the Cloud – ReadWriteCloud.