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Digital Rights Ireland (DRI) has become the third organisation to be designated as a ‘qualified entity’ (QE) under consumer-rights legislation enacted in 2023.
Lawyers at McCann FitzGerald note that all three of the QEs designated so far are active in the privacy and digital rights sphere, with the two others being the European Center for Digital Rights (also known as NOYB) and the Irish Council for Civil Liberties (ICCL).
The Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment designates QEs under the Representative Actions for the Protection of the Collective Interests of Consumers Act 2023.
Third-party funding
Under the act, only designated QEs can bring representative actions in Ireland and throughout the EU on behalf of groups of consumers for infringements of certain consumer-protection laws.
“As with the other two QEs designated in Ireland, DRI faces the challenge of funding representative actions in the absence of third-party litigation funding in Ireland,” the McCann FitzGerald lawyers note.
In July, the ICCL lodged a complaint with the European Commission alleging that the prohibition on third-party funding meant that Ireland was in breach of the Representative Actions Directive.
Article 20(1) of the directive obliges member states to take measures that aim to ensure that the costs of proceedings linked to representative actions “do not prevent qualified entities from effectively exercising their right”.
Litigation
DRI is a non-profit organisation that aims to defend civil, human, and legal digital rights, with a particular emphasis on privacy, data protection, and state surveillance.
McCann FitzGerald notes that its recent activity includes filing complaints with the Data Protection Commission on Ireland’s Public Services Card and raising concerns about garda use of facial-recognition technology.
“It has been involved in litigation before the Irish and EU courts, with one action resulting in the EU Data Retention Directive being declared invalid by the Court of Justice of the European Union in 2014 on the basis that it constituted a disproportionate and serious interference with fundamental privacy rights and the protection of personal data,” the firm’s lawyers add.
“With the three QEs designated in Ireland operating in the privacy and digital-rights sphere, consumer-facing businesses should be alert to the potential for representative actions in these areas,” the lawyers conclude.