Independent Service Providers (ISP) group welcomes the Data Act entry into application, but cautions against deregulation

PRESS RELEASE

BRUSSELS; 12 September, 2025 - The Independent Service Providers (ISP) group welcomes the official entry into application of the Data Act today, 12 September 2025, and acknowledges the publication of the sector-specific Guidance Document for the automotive industry. These are important milestones for Europe's digital transition and a crucial step towards fair and transparent data-sharing in the automotive sector.

The Data Act establishes important principles: it gives users of IoT devices rights over the data they generate, ensures that such data can be shared with third parties of their choice, and sets obligations on data holders to make information transparent and accessible. For the automotive aftermarket, an efficient application of the Act is particularly relevant, as it provides a horizontal legal framework to begin addressing the challenges of fair access to vehicle-generated data.

The Data Act thereby intends to give fair access to vehicle data to secure competition, support innovation, promote the development of competitive European connected mobility services and ensure consumers benefit from affordable and sustainable mobility services.

Simplification must not mean deregulation

While supporting genuine efforts to streamline compliance, ISPs caution against calls to recast the Data Act as voluntary or weaken core obligations under the auspices of reducing administrative burdens notably through the upcoming Digital Omnibus.

Such approaches risk undermining the very objectives of the Act:

• For independent service providers, the real barrier to competitive digital mobility services is not paperwork, but restricted access to vehicle data. Diluting the Data Act would entrench market asymmetries, benefiting only a handful of dominant players.
• Voluntary frameworks cannot substitute binding rules where structural imbalances exist, as experience in the automotive sector has already demonstrated.

Simplification must not be mistaken for deregulation. To foster trust, ensure legal certainty, and enable all businesses - particularly SMEs - to compete and innovate, Europe requires clear and enforceable rules.

Effective enforcement is key

The ISP group is also concerned by indications that the Data Act might be implemented with only "soft" enforcement. Without robust and harmonised oversight across Member States, the rights and obligations enshrined in the Data Act risk remaining only on paper.

ISPs therefore call on the European Commission and Member States to:

• Ensure that enforcement is consistent, strong and effective across the Union;
• Safeguard the integrity of the Data Act from attempts to reopen or dilute it through upcoming legislative packages;
• Recognise the Act as the first step towards sector-specific legislation (SSL) to fully address the challenges of fair in-vehicle data access.

The ISP group reaffirms its commitment to working constructively with policymakers, businesses and stakeholders to build a competitive, innovative and consumer-oriented automotive ecosystem underpinned by fair access to vehicle data, and intends to make use of the legislative instrument provided by the European Commission while reporting on its practical implementation.

Download the press release here.

The Undersigning Associations

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