The Big Story: Congress must act after Privacy Shield rollback leaves startups without certainty. A Senate panel held a hearing this week to examine ways of creating a new transatlantic data transfer pact after Europe’s top court struck down the EU-U.S. Privacy Shield earlier this year. The cross-border data pact allowed U.S. companies to process and store European users’ data in America, and the rollback of the agreement is already having adverse effects for thousands of startups and tech companies.

The Big Story: Privacy Shield rollback leads to new complaints over U.S. websites. The recent court decision striking down a transatlantic data transfer deal is already having adverse effects for websites of all sizes. This week, a European privacy group founded by Austrian privacy activist Max Schrems filed complaints with European Union data regulators against 101 websites that use tools like Google Analytics and Facebook Connect.

The Big Story: EU, U.S. negotiating on “enhanced” data transfer pact. The United States and the European Union are discussing the formation of a new transatlantic data transfer pact to replace the Privacy Shield framework struck down by Europe’s top court last month. In a joint press statement released on Monday, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and European Commissioner for Justice Didier Reynders said that they “have initiated discussions to evaluate the potential for an enhanced EU-U.S. Privacy Shield framework to comply with the July 16 judgment.”

The Big Story: EU court strikes down transatlantic data transfer pact. The Court of Justice of the European Union this week struck down Privacy Shield, a transatlantic agreement that lets U.S. companies process and store European users’ data in the U.S. The ruling creates uncertainty for many U.S. and EU companies by jeopardizing the flow of data between Europe and the United States. The case, known as “Schrems II,” evolved out of Austrian privacy activist Max Schrems’ 2013 lawsuit following the revelations about the U.S. government’s surveillance programs by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden.