On 9 August 2023, the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) and the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) published a joint position paper on Harmful Design in Digital Markets (Harmful Designs Paper) that urges businesses to stop using harmful website designs that exploit customers by encouraging them to provide more personal data than necessary. The regulators are

The Summer 2023 Edition of the quarterly IT & Data Protection Newsletter by Reed Smith Germany has just been released:

English version
German versionContinue Reading Get your Update on IT & Data Protection Law in our Germany Newsletter (Summer 2023 Edition)

Please click here to access the source post from our Global Regulatory Enforcement Law Blog.

In this blog, the authors delve into a significant decision by the German Federal Cartel Office (FCO) four years ago, accusing a major technology company of abusive behavior due to alleged violations of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Recently

The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has published a report on reprimands issued in the second quarter of the year, from April to June 2023. The recent reprimands by ICO shed light on areas of data protection where organizations across the public and private sectors have fallen foul of the UK GDPR and are instructive as to how organisations can improve their practices. Our blog focuses on three key lessons gleaned from these reprimands.Continue Reading Three lessons from ICO’s quarterly enforcement report

The UK Department for Culture, Media and Sport published draft Product Security and Telecommunications Infrastructure (Security Requirements for Relevant Connectable Products) Regulations 2023 (Draft Security Regulations). These regulations fall under the Product Security and Telecommunications Infrastructure Act 2022 (PSTIA) which come into effect on 29 April 2024 and which you can read about in our earlier blog. Part 1 of the PSTIA establishes a regulatory framework that imposes security requirements on manufacturers, importers, and distributors of these products. The Draft Security Regulations outline the specific security requirements for manufacturers.Continue Reading Navigating the Path to Compliance: Takeaways from the New Draft Security Regulations for Connected Devices

The UK’s new Product Security and Telecommunications Infrastructure Act 2022 will take effect on 29 April 2024, and will require manufacturers to implement minimum-security standards on all consumer products with internet or network connectivity, such as smartphones, smart meters, CCTV cameras, smart speakers, games consoles, smart doorbells, and medical devices and wearables before they can be made available for purchase.Continue Reading From Smartphones to Alarm Systems: UK Mandates Minimum Security for Connected Devices

Digital Markets Act: Developments since its proposal  

Following the European Commission’s initial proposal of the Digital Markets Act (DMA) in December 2020, its adoption by the European Parliament in March 2022 and the entry into force on November 1, 2022, the DMA will finally apply from May 2, 2023. The DMA contains a list of obligations and prohibitions, subject to fines, that core platform services (CPS) provided by so-called gatekeepers must comply with in their daily operations. CPS should therefore be assessed at an early stage regarding whether or not they fall within the scope of regulation of the DMA.

As is set out in the following, the DMA poses significant business challenges for (potential)
gatekeepers, which should be addressed in a legally sound, comprehensive and systematic manner in order to prevent disruptions to the relevant businesses. Continue Reading Countdown to compliance: The DMA to apply to digital gatekeepers from May 2, 2023  

On 13 March 2023, the Information Commissioner’s Office (‘ICO’) published new guidance, ‘Privacy in the product design lifecycle’, to help technology professionals, such as UX designers, product managers and software engineers, keep data protection considerations at the forefront of their products and services. The guidance describes how to tackle privacy issues arising at each stage of the design and development process, as summarised below.Continue Reading Takeaways from ICO’s “Privacy in the product design lifecycle” guidance

The winter 2023 edition of the quarterly IT & Data Protection Newsletter by Reed Smith Germany has just been released:

English version

German versionContinue Reading Get your update on IT & data protection law in our newsletter (Winter 2023 edition)