Refrigerators automatically doing grocery shopping for you on your drive home from work and cell phone attachments measuring glucose levels don’t necessarily seem like bad things. But with the explosion of cutting-edge smart devices and applications comes the mounting data privacy concerns of the so-called “Internet of Things.”

The “Internet of Things” refers to the

Addressing an issue of first impression, the Pennsylvania Superior Court ruled last week that a venue analysis dating to 1967 focusing on the location of dissemination of allegedly defamatory newspapers applied to online defamation suits as well.  As a result, the proper venue for Pennsylvania defamation suits based on website content is any county where a third party who knows the plaintiff personally reads the content and understands it to be harmful to the plaintiff’s reputation. The ruling enlarges the potential venue options for defamation plaintiffs and could lead to website publishers and social media posters being sued in any county in Pennsylvania.
Continue Reading Pennsylvania Superior Court holds county where reputational harm occurs is proper venue for Internet defamation suits, confirming 50-year-old inquiry applies to website-based claims

The European Banking Authority (EBA) released ‘Final guidelines on the security of internet payments’ (Guidelines). These Guidelines are based on the work published by the European Forum on the Security of Retail Payments (SecuRe Pay) and set the minimum security requirements that Payment Services Providers (PSPs) in the EU will be expected to

2022 was another busy year in privacy and data protection. We have seen major new developments at both the EU and the UK level, in terms of new legislation taking effect, changes to the data transfer regime, analytics cookies coming under regulatory spotlight from various EU data protection authorities, and substantial fines issued for breaches of data protection law.

Regulations surrounding privacy and data continue to develop at a rapid pace. Emerging technologies have changed the manner in which personal data is collected and used. These technologies and developments present new challenges for companies and consumers alike. As a result, 2023 could be an exciting and a busy year for privacy and data.

We asked some of our Tech & Data team members in the field to get their opinions on what is likely to happen in privacy and data in 2023:Continue Reading EU and UK privacy and data predictions for 2023

The European Commission published a proposal for a Cyber Resilience Act on 15 September 2022 (the ‘Regulation’), which aims to:

  • ensure that cyber security is considered during the development of hardware and software products and is continuously improved throughout that product’s life cycle; and
  • improve transparency so that users can take cybersecurity into account when selecting and using a product with digital elements.

Continue Reading EU Commission proposes Cyber Resilience Act to bolster the EU’s cyber security rules.

Although regulators seem to think all too often that cybersecurity is an after-thought for internet-connected device manufacturers, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) recognizes that as the Internet of Things (IoT) grows, so do cybersecurity risks. In March 2021, NIST published several key takeaways from a recent workshop that provide helpful guidance for IoT manufacturers so that they can be more pro-active in securing IoT devices.
Continue Reading Recent report signals NIST may publish IoT cybersecurity standards

The German Federal Cabinet adopted the Telecommunications and Telemedia Data Protection Act (Telekommunikation-Telemedien-Datenschutzgesetz – TTDSG, available here) on February 10, 2021. The TTDSG, among other things, provides new rules on cookies and similar technologies (Cookies), introducing only two categories of Cookies: (1) strictly necessary Cookies and (2) consent-based Cookies. The legal basis of legitimate interests cannot be relied upon for Cookies anymore. Germany will be the last member state to transpose Article 5(3) of the Directive 2002/58/EC, amended by Directive 2009/136/EC (ePrivacy Directive) into national law – almost a decade after the deadline passed, and ignoring the extensive discussions on the Cookie provisions in the ePrivacy Regulation (and particularly the exceptions from the consent requirement).
Continue Reading A new recipe for Cookies – The new German Telecommunications and Telemedia Data Protection Act

The European Union Blockchain Observatory and Forum, on 21 April, published a report examining how blockchain can be combined with two other important emerging technologies – the Internet of Things (IoT) and artificial intelligence (AI) – to complement each other and build new kinds of platforms, products, and services.

The report first looks at the interplay of blockchain with the IoT, addressing how blockchain can aid its functioning by providing a decentralised platform to the otherwise centralised approach of the IoT. This centralisation poses a number of challenges while monitoring, controlling, and facilitating communication between the millions of heterogeneous devices. The report highlights how blockchain can provide a more robust, more scalable, and more direct platform to overcome these challenges.

The report similarly delves into the potential relationship between blockchain and AI. It explains some concerns surrounding AI, like how it is currently concentrated in the hands of a few large companies due to the high cost of gathering, storing, and processing the large amounts of data, as well as engaging AI experts. It then illustrates how blockchain can mitigate such concerns so that access to AI models is more readily available to individuals and small companies.Continue Reading EU Blockchain Observatory and Forum explores the convergence of blockchain, AI, and the IoT