On 25 May 2018, multiple companies in the U.S. – from Shoes.com to the Chicago Tribune –blocked users in the EU from accessing their websites altogether. That’s how scared large businesses were of being ensnared by the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) on the day it entered into force. 

Just two years later, the Commission is getting ready to unleash another proposal that lawyers expect to wreak just as much havoc.