"In this magisterial study, Bart van der Sloot and César Augusto Fontanillo López critically revisit the traditional categories of data that structure and animate European laws concerned with regulating the use of data and information technologies. They pose the timely question whether these categories are still fit for purpose as a regulatory point of departure in an age of rampant datafication. While their answer is not a categorical no, they ably show how the categories' utility is increasingly undermined, and they weigh up the pros and cons of various remedial strategies, also taking account of the approaches taken by selected non-European jurisdictions. All up, this book provides an exceptionally comprehensive, incisive and nuanced parsing of key features of current data regulation, with a firm eye on the needs and challenges of the future." -- Lee A. Bygrave, Professor of Law, University of Oslo "It's all about the data. This important book provides a crucial roadmap to how EU law defines and governs different types of information. It questions the conventional data classifications in EU law, now over a half-century old, and offers five possible paths forward.

A thoughtful and deeply researched deep-dive into a vitally important topic in data protection law." -- Paul Schwartz Jefferson E. Peyser Professor of Law Co-Director, Berkeley Center for Law & Technology.