Bøker i Law, Governance and Technology Series-serien

Can we regulate something that doesn¿t exist yet? Can Europe create its own Silicon Valley? Who gets to create technological value in today¿s world? Whatever happened to the once-flourishing idea of rags to riches? Will new and exciting innovations only ever come from big tech companies? Can the EU establish its own flexible framework for boosting innovation, e.g. by facilitating the transformative use of technologies and data?This book seeks to answer these questions by exploring the differences in copyright culture in Europe and the United States, with its flexible fair use framework. The findings are anything but obvious, and decades of case law on both sides of the Atlantic tell a story of judges going to great lengths to deal with new challenges while navigating the imperfections of statutory law ¿ both where it is too broadly formulated and where it is too prescriptive.How can the population¿s creative potential best be fostered? What do software innovations have in common with the evolution of living organisms? What are the vulnerabilities of distributed creativity? Answers are sought in the processes that came into being during the early years of the digital revolution and were then forced to take a back seat as control of the means of production was increasingly placed in the hands of tech companies. The findings and insights presented here are highly relevant for today¿s digital policymaking. Market concentration processes in innovation haven¿t ceased; they are ongoing. And in an age where data-driven services are creating and reinforcing global oligopolies, the question posed by the U.S. Supreme Court in Google v. Oracle is now more relevant than ever: who should hold the keys to digital innovation?

With the growing capabilities of artificial intelligence, governments are integrating AI technologies into administrative and even judicial decision-making, aiding and in some cases even replacing human decision-makers. Predictive policing, automated benefits administration, and automated risk assessment in criminal sentencing are but a few prominent examples of a general trend. While the turn towards governmental automated decision-making promises to reduce the impact of human biases and produce efficiency gains, reducing the human element in governmental decision-making also entails significant risks. This book analyses these risks through a comparative constitutional law and human rights lens, examining US law, German law, and international human rights law. It also highlights the structural challenges that automation poses for legal systems built on the assumption of exclusively human decision-making. Special attention is paid to the question whether existing law can adequately address the lack of transparency in governmental automated decision-making, its discriminatory processes and outcomes, as well as its fundamental challenge to human agency. Building on that analysis, it proposes a path towards securing the values of human dignity and agency at the heart of democratic societies and the rule of law in an increasingly automated world. This book will be of interest to researchers and scholars focusing on the evolving relationship of law and technology as well as human rights scholars. Further, it represents a valuable contribution to the debate on the regulation of artificial intelligence and the role human rights can play in that process.

This book identifies the principles that should be applied when processing Big Data in the context of food safety risk assessments. Food safety is a critical goal in the protection of individuals' right to health and the flourishing of the food and feed market. Big Data is fostering new applications capable of enhancing the accuracy of food safety risk assessments. An extraordinary amount of information is analysed to detect the existence or predict the likelihood of future risks, also by means of machine learning algorithms. Big Data and novel analysis techniques are topics of growing interest for food safety agencies, including the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA). This wealth of information brings with it both opportunities and risks concerning the extraction of meaningful inferences from data. However, conflicting interests and tensions among the parties involved are hindering efforts to find shared methods for steering the processing of Big Data in a sound, transparent and trustworthy way. While consumers call for more transparency, food business operators tend to be reluctant to share informational assets. This has resulted in a considerable lack of trust in the EU food safety system. A recent legislative reform, supported by new legal cases, aims to restore confidence in the risk analysis system by reshaping the meaning of data ownership in this domain. While this regulatory approach is being established, breakthrough analytics techniques are encouraging thinking about the next steps in managing food safety data in the age of machine learning.The book focuses on two core topics - data ownership and data governance - by evaluating how the regulatory framework addresses the challenges raised by Big Data and its analysis in an applied, significant, and overlooked domain. To do so, it adopts an interdisciplinary approach that considers both the technological advances and the policy tools adopted in the European Union, while also assuming an ethical perspective when exploring potential solutions. The conclusion puts forward a proposal: an ethical blueprint for identifying the principles - Security, Accountability, Fairness, Explainability, Transparency and Privacy - to be observed when processing Big Data for food safety purposes, including by means of machine learning. Possible implementations are then discussed, also in connection with two recent legislative proposals, namely the Data Governance Act and the Artificial Intelligence Act.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) systems are increasingly being deployed by marketing entities in connection with consumers' interactions. Thanks to machine learning (ML) and cognitive computing technologies, businesses can now analyse vast amounts of data on consumers, generate new knowledge, use it to optimize certain processes, and undertake tasks that were previously impossible.Against this background, this book analyses new algorithmic commercial practices, discusses their challenges for consumers, and measures such developments against the current EU legislative framework on consumer protection. The book adopts an interdisciplinary approach, building on empirical findings from AI applications in marketing and theoretical insights from marketing studies, and combining them with normative analysis of privacy and consumer protection in the EU.The content is divided into three parts. The first part analyses the phenomenon of algorithmic marketing practices and reviews the main AI and AI-related technologies used in marketing, e.g. Big data, ML and NLP. The second part describes new commercial practices, including the massive monitoring and profiling of consumers, the personalization of advertising and offers, the exploitation of psychological and emotional insights, and the use of human-like interfaces to trigger emotional responses. The third part provides a comprehensive analysis of current EU consumer protection laws and policies in the field of commercial practices. It focuses on two main legal concepts, their shortcomings, and potential refinements: vulnerability, understood as the conceptual benchmark for protecting consumers from unfair algorithmic practices; manipulation, the substantive legal measure for drawing the line between fair and unfair practices.

In the era of globalisation, cross-border crimes are becoming increasingly common. The nature of these crimes is complex, and cross-border evidence exchange is, therefore, crucial to the successful prosecution of these offences. The exchange of evidence between countries can provide invaluable assistance in solving crimes that have an international dimension. The European Investigation Order (EIO) allows judicial authorities to request evidence more quickly and easily than via traditional instruments. The EIO has become the primary legal tool for gathering trans-border evidence, replacing the traditional Mutual Legal Assistance (MLA) conventions previously used. However, the EIO is not the only pertinent legal instrument for cross-border evidence gathering within the EU. Accordingly, professionals need a clear understanding of this subject.Exchanging evidence among judicial authorities in the EU Member States presupposes twoessential components. First, there must be a secure communication channel. This is provided by e-CODEX, which offers a European digital infrastructure for secure cross-border communication in the field of justice. Recently (May 30th, 2022), the e-CODEX system became the digital backbone of EU judicial cooperation in civil and criminal matters on the basis of Regulation 2022/850. To achieve effective evidence exchange via EIO/MLA legal instruments, there must also be a communication tool. This is provided by the e-Evidence Digital Exchange System, which is capable of managing any EIO/MLA procedures/instruments, from the e-Forms (EIO Annexes) to the whole business logic, on the basis of the e-CODEX system. Finally, it is essential to use a uniform standard for the representation of evidence data and metadata, so as to streamline the process and make investigations more effective, in particular when it comes to complicated criminal cases where it is key to find either correlations amongdifferent cases or to extract multiple types of data from the same inspection. The importance of cross-border evidence exchange in criminal matters cannot be overstated. This book addresses all the above-mentioned aspects, offering an up-to-date overview of scenarios in cross-border judicial cooperation from both juridical and technical standpoints.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) can benefit our society and economy, but also brings with it new challenges and raises legal and ethical questions. According to the author of this comprehensive analysis, it is imperative to ensure that AI is developed and applied in an appropriate legal and regulatory framework that promotes innovation and investment and, at the same time, addresses the risks associated with certain uses of AI-related technologies.Essential to understanding the relationship between policy and law, this book traces the evolution of EU policy on artificial intelligence and robotics, focusing in particular on the EU¿s ethical framework for AI, which defines trust as a prerequisite for ensuring a human-centric approach.The main part of the book provides a thorough and systematic analysis of the Commission¿s 2021 proposed AI Act, which establishes harmonised rules for the development, placement on the market and use of AI systems in the EU. The author painstakingly compares the Commission¿s proposed AI Act with the numerous ¿compromise¿ proposals of the Council of the European Union, leading to the final version of the Council¿s AI Act (general approach) and its formal adoption on 6 December 2022. The author also examines with extraordinary detail the amendments proposed by the relevant committees and political groups of the European Parliament, revealing the position the Parliament is likely to adopt in the forthcoming negotiations with the Commission and the Council on the text of the AI Act.Numerous legislative and policy documents are presented in detail, while the analysis also considers the comments made by all interested parties (e.g. the European Commission, Council of the European Union, European Parliament, governmental organisations, national competent authorities, and stakeholders/actors with different/conflicting interests, such as corporations, business and consumer associations, civil society and other non-profit organisations). In the course of its in-depth analysis, this book will provide readers with crucial insight into the reasons behind the European Institutions¿ different approaches and the often contradictory interests of stakeholders. Because the policy arguments are carefully balanced and drafted with scrupulous care, this volume will establish itself as a reference resource to be consulted for years to come.

Blockchains and smart contracts are emerging technologies that pose unique challenges for legal systems. This book outlines the extent to which these new and innovative technologies could have potentially disruptive effects on contract law in Europe. It does so through a comparative, three-part analysis of the recognisability and effects of smart contracts in European legal systems. First of all, in light of the technologies¿ transboundary nature, the book employs a comparative approach, considering French law, German law, English law, and Dutch law to analyse the impact on the different systems of contract law. While doing so, it also addresses the formation, interpretation, and vitiation of contracts. Secondly, it analyses the impact of these technologies on European laws regarding unfair terms in consumer contracts and argues that the existing rules should be applied to smart legal agreements in business-to-consumer relations. Lastly, it analyses the current European rules of private international law on the basis of which jurisdiction and applicable law are developed. In this respect, the book concludes that the vast majority of these European rules are ¿smart contract-proof¿.

The past two decades have seen a radical change in the online landscape with the emergence of GAFAM (Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple and Microsoft). Facebook, specifically, has acquired a unique monopoly position among social media, and is part of the digital lives of billions of users. A mutual influence between Facebook and the legal framework has gradually emerged, as EU legislators and judges are on the one hand forced to accept the reality of new, widespread behaviors and practices and on the other have constructed a legal framework that imposes limits and rules on the use of the social network.This book offers a unique perspective on this relationship, exploring the various activities and services proposed by Facebook and discussing the attendant legal issues. Accordingly, questions concerning the GDPR, its principles, rights and obligations are in the center of the discussions. However, the book does not limit its scope to data protection: Facebook has also greatly contributed to a liberalization and democratization of speech. In accordance, the classic principles of media law must be revisited, adapted or suitably enforced on the platform. Intellectual property law governs what is owned and by whom, no matter whether raw data or informational goods are concerned. Frameworks on hate speech and fake news are the result of coregulation principles of governance, whereas defamation jurisprudence continues to evolve, considering the consequences of merely "e;liking"e; certain content. The economic model of advertising is also governed by strict rules. Above all, Facebook is currently caught in a dilemma of substantial interest for society as a whole: is it a neutral online intermediary, i.e., merely a passive player on the Internet, or is it transforming against its will into an editorial service? In conclusion, the book has a dual purpose. First, it proposes a global and practical approach to the EU legal framework on Facebook. Second, it explores the current limits and the ongoing transformation of EU Internet law as it steadily adapts to life in the new digital world.

To protect this right, the author advocates the licensing of personal identifiable images where appropriate.The book reviews American, UK and European case law concerning privacy and confidentiality, the effect each case has had on the developing jurisprudence, and the ethical issues involved.

This book brings together the expertise of two authors involved in initiating the development of Online Family Dispute Resolution (OFDR), while also examining the unique Australian system.

This book discusses critical privacy and data protection aspects of biometric systems from a legal perspective, offering a systematic analysis of the many issues raised by these systems, along with recommendations for a transnational regulatory framework.

This compact, highly engaging book examines the international legal regulation of both the conduct of States among themselves and conduct towards individuals, in relation to the use of cyberspace.

The book addresses challenging topics at theintersection of communication technologies and biotech innovations such asfreedom of expression, right to health, knowledge production, Internet contentregulation, accessibility and freedom of scientific research.

This book examines the changes in the governance of human expression as a result of the development of the Internet.

This book throws new light on the way in which the Internet impacts on democracy. The book also assesses the ways in which law, as an institution and a system, reacts to the changes and challenges brought about by the Internet: the ways in which law may retain its strength as an integrative force, avoiding a 'virtual' legitimacy crisis.

This monograph poses a series of key problems of evidential reasoning and argumentation. It provides a hands-on survey explaining to the reader how to use current argumentation methods and concepts that are increasingly being implemented in more precise ways for the application of software tools in computational argumentation systems.

Exploring the ways in which new techniques in markup language can enhance the vital task of quality assessment in drafting legal documents, this work presents a fresh approach which tackles pressing issues such as the lack of descriptive metadata schemas.

This book explores ways that robot technology may affect legal systems in matters of responsibility and agency in criminal law, contractual obligations and torts. Discusses robot soldiers in battle, robo-trading of securities and service robots in torts law.

This book examines the fundamental question of how legislators and other rule-makers should handle remembering and forgetting information (especially personally identifiable information) in the digital age.

This book addresses the question of how to achieve social coordination in Socio-Cognitive Technical Systems (SCTS).

This book presents cutting edge research on the new ethical challenges posed by biomedical Big Data technologies and practices.

This volume presents analyses of data protection systems and of 26 jurisdictions with data protection legislation in Africa, as well as additional selected countries without comprehensive data protection laws.