Need to Keep Analytics Data in the EU? Cloudflare Zaraz Can Offer a Solution


A recent decision from the Austrian Data Protection Authority (the Datenschutzbehörde) has network engineers scratching their heads and EU companies that use Google Analytics scrambling. The Datenschutzbehörde found that an Austrian website’s use of Google Analytics violates the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) as interpreted by the “Schrems II” case because Google Analytics can involve sending full or truncated IP addresses to the United States.
While disabling such trackers might be one (extreme) solution, doing so would leave website operators blind to how users are engaging with their site. A better approach: find a way to use tools like Google Analytics, but do so with an approach that protects the privacy of personal information and keeps it in the EU, avoiding a data transfer altogether. Enter Cloudflare Zaraz.
But before we get into just how Cloudflare Zaraz can help, we need to explain a bit of the background for the Datenschutzbehörde’s ruling, and why it’s a big deal.
What are the privacy and data localization issues?
The GDPR is a comprehensive data privacy law that applies to EU residents’ personal data, regardless of where it is processed. The GDPR itself does not insist that personal data must Continue reading
fabric services.