Automated Decision-Making and the Precautionary Principle in EU Law

Abstract The article is predicated upon the allegation that there is a similarity between the scientific uncertainty linked to the hazard which human interventions pose to the natural environment and the hazard which the development of automated decision-making techniques poses to certain aspects of human lives in the digital environment. On the basis of this allegation, the analysis examines the similarities between the European environmental law, which is crucial for the natural environment, and the European data protection law, which is fundamental for the digital environment. As there are measures already adopted by the data protection law from the environmental law, such as impact assessments and the right to access information, the main hypothesis of this analysis is to consider whether there are further inspirations for the development of European data protection law which could be drawn from environmental law, regarding the scientific uncertainty which is common to these two areas of regulation. The article examines a legal measure, namely, the precautionary principle, as the conjectural response to the challenges linked to the development of the new technologies. The experiences collected in the area of environmental law concerning the precautionary principle are analysed as a source of lessons to be learned concerning the regulatory measures adopted in order to deal with scientific uncertainty, not only in the natural environment, but also in the digital one.