There are many proposals under consideration for how to craft data protection laws and regulations that can protect consumer privacy while giving consumers more control over their personal information. One important provision that can be considered in data protection laws and regulations to improve consumer welfare is data portability. Unlike many restrictive provisions in data protection laws designed to limit how data is used and shared, data portability is a permissive provision intended to increase data use and sharing. As such, data portability is an important provision for policymakers interested in promoting data-driven innovation.

Data portability allows consumers to obtain a digital copy of their personal information from online services and provide this information to other services, allowing consumers to obtain more value from their data, creating new opportunities for businesses to innovate with data, and fostering competition. However, data portability requirements should be carefully designed to avoid imposing unnecessary costs on organizations, exposing proprietary information, or undermining consumer privacy.