ES Site Search | Osborne Clarke

The long-awaited PRC Personal Information Protection Law (the PIPL), China’s equivalent of the EU's General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), was finally passed by the Standing Committee of the People’s Republic of China on 20 August 2021, and will enter into force on 1 November 2021. The new law is composed...

06/09/2021

As the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) launches a market study into how the modern-day music value chain operates, we ask what this means for the sector and who should be getting involved. What is the CMA proposing to cover ? Essentially, it will review the music value chain from...

10 mins

01/02/2022

The UK government has released (17 June 2022) its response to the consultation, "Data: a new direction", on the existing data protection regime in the UK. The response sets out the government's proposed post-Brexit reforms to the UK's data protection regime, which is currently based on the General Data Protection...

28/06/2022

On 18 July, the UK government published its " AI Governance and Regulation: Policy Statement", which includes a call for views and evidence that closes on 26 September. The overview sets out the government's proposed approach to regulating artificial intelligence (AI). As anticipated, the government intends to use this as...

19/07/2022

Compensation claims: a new role for the ICO? | Establishing a pro-innovation approach to regulating AI | BEIS consults on the interoperability and cyber security of smart appliances

28/07/2022

Data Protection and Digital Information Bill laid before Parliament | UK government announces adequacy agreement in principle with South Korea | UK and US governments announce intention to bring Data Access Agreement into force this autumn

28/07/2022

The Digital Regulation Cooperation Forum (DRCF) has launched a new digital regulation research portal. This portal brings together over 80 pieces of recent research into emerging and future digital developments from DRCF members and other regulatory bodies. Given the rapid digitalisation of business and the increasing scope of regulations that...

06/04/2022

Negotiations between relevant stakeholders regarding the EU’s Regulation on a Single Market for Digital Services - better known as the Digital Services Act (DSA) - have come to an end. After numerous and extensive discussions, the French presidency of the Council of the EU, the Commission and members of the...

16/05/2022

Edinburgh reforms The " Edinburgh Reforms", announced by the chancellor on 9 December 2022, are a package of measures which aim to " drive growth and competitiveness in the financial services sector". The reforms, which build on the work being done in the Financial Services and Markets Bill 2022-23 (FSM...

27/01/2023

EU: Digital Markets Act The Digital Markets Act (DMA) was published in the Official Journal of the EU on 12 October 2022. It will enter into force on 1 November 2022, 20 days after appearing in the Official Journal. Following this, the rules in the DMA will be applied after...

8 mins

26/10/2022

The UK government has published new legislation (27 March 2023) that will expand the scope of the financial promotions regime in the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (FSMA) to now capture promotions relating to certain cryptoassets. What has happened? Following consultation by the government in 2020, the scope of...

30/03/2023

The UK's long-awaited white paper on artificial intelligence (AI), published on 29 March, has indicated that the government will issue a non-statutory definition of AI for regulatory purposes and a set of high-level overarching principles. The white paper, "A pro-innovation approach to AI regulation", explains the government's proposal that existing...

31/03/2023

The digital age of financial services brings both exciting opportunities and new risks, as the sector relies more heavily on information communication technology (ICT). The EU regulation on digital operational resilience for the financial sector, known as the Digital Operational Resilience Act (DORA), aims to boost and harmonise ICT requirements...

22/12/2022

The Science and Technology Framework published by the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) earlier this year confirms the role of future telecommunications as a critical technology in the UK that needs to flourish to deliver the government's aim of becoming a science and technology superpower by 2030. The...

2 mins

07/06/2023

The Electronic Trade Documents Act 2023, which comes into force on 20 September 2023, allows the possession of electronic trade documents and establishes an important new principle that an electronic trade document has the same legal effect as an equivalent paper form if the circumstances under the legislation are met...

12/09/2023

Update on AI Act progress The third round of trilogue negotiations between the EU Commission, Council and Parliament on the detail of the AI Act took place on 2 and 3 October. One of the Parliamentary rapporteurs on the legislation has shared that agreement has been reached on important issues...

31/10/2023

While there is a great deal of discussion on "What to do about AI" at national and international levels, the UK has so far taken a very light touch and simply asked existing regulators to develop an AI strategy based on their existing powers, shaped by non-statutory "high level principles"...

14/06/2024

On 24 October 2023, the British Private Equity & Venture Capital Association launched the Venture Capital Investment Compact with the support of the government. Compact is a commitment by UK venture capital and growth equity fund managers to develop a long-term and constructive working relationship with UK pension investors and...

16/11/2023

The long-awaited Online Safety Act (OSA) finally became law last month. This mammoth legislation represents one of the world's most ambitious attempts yet to regulate online service providers and make the online world a safer place. (Read our overview of the OSA.) Ofcom has now published its first consultation under...

2 mins

21/11/2023

EU AI Act On 8 December 2023, negotiators for the European Parliament and Council of the EU reached political agreement on the shape and contents of the ground-breaking EU regulation on AI – the AI Act. However, this represents the beginning of the end of the legislative process, rather than...

11/01/2024

As artificial intelligence technology moves faster than ever, how can the existing regulatory framework address new risks?

29/01/2024

Trials have been scheduled for early 2027 at Southwark Crown Court of nine individuals charged by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) in relation to an alleged unauthorised foreign exchange trading scheme promoted on social media. The landmark case is the first time the FCA has sought to prosecute social media...

12/08/2024

BoE speech on modernising UK payments On 15 April 2024, the Bank of England (BoE) published a speech by Sarah Breeden, the Bank of England's Deputy Governor, Financial Stability, which set out how the BoE seeks to deliver trust and support innovation, both as a provider and as a regulator...

31/05/2024

LockBit operations disrupted by international law enforcement | Joint advisory about state-sponsored cyber attackers compromising critical infrastructure | Potential delay to Cyber Resilience Act

28/02/2024

Treasury Committee highlights levels of SME bank account closures by major banks | FCA's key findings of review of claims management companies carrying out unregulated claims | Law Commission consultation on draft digital assets bill

27/03/2024

EU updates EU AI Act adopted by Parliament The EU AI Act was formally adopted by the European Parliament on 13 March 2024 – see the adopted text. This is not the last step in the legislative process but is an important milestone. The speed at which the texts were...

27/03/2024

Government response to call for views on code of practice for software vendors As previously reported, the government published a voluntary code of practice and related call for views for software vendors in May 2024, establishing a set of voluntary security and resilience measures for organisations developing or selling software...

26/03/2025

Individual sentenced to four years in prison for illegal crypto activity worth over £2.5m On 28 February 2025, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) announced the sentencing of Olumide Osunkoya, who illegally operated crypto ATMs (machines that convert money into cryptoassets or vice versa) at 28 different locations, despite being refused...

26/03/2025

UK updates UK House of Lords Select Committee inquiry into scaling up AI and creative tech The UK House of Lords Communications and Digital Committee has launched an inquiry looking at the challenges startups face when seeking to scale up in AI and creative technology. According to the committee, various...

25/09/2024

Peter Warcup, Associate, and Nina Lazic, Partner, at Osborne Clarke consider recent developments for cyber-focused regulation, including the UK Cyber Security and Resilience Bill that was announced in July and the European Commission’s consultation on the draft revised Network and Information Systems Directive, or NIS2, implementing regulation. This article was...

8 mins

14/10/2024

The European Commission's digital fairness "fitness check" was launched in 2022 to assess whether the current EU consumer law framework is fit for purpose in the digital environment and consider whether any new regulation is needed to ensure digital fairness for consumers. The fairness check addresses rising concerns that online...

24/10/2024

Updates on authorised push payment fraud PSR confirms £85,000 maximum reimbursement limit for APP fraud On 25 September 2024, the Payment Systems Regulator (PSR) published a press release confirming its decision on the maximum reimbursement limit for victims of Faster Payments authorised push payment (APP) fraud, setting the new maximum...

30/10/2024

Third HM Treasury consultation on regulation of BNPL products On 17 October 2024, HM Treasury published a consultation paper on draft legislation on the regulation of buy now, pay later (BNPL). In the consultation, HM Treasury seeks views on the legislation that will bring BNPL products within the scope of...

27/11/2024

UK Online Safety Act 2023 This year we will see some of the Online Safety Act 2023 (OSA) , designed to improve user safety in the online world, coming into effect. The OSA became law in October 2023 and, while some provisions are already in effect, compliance with the main...

10 mins

13/01/2025

As artificial intelligence (AI) systems become business-critical assets, companies will need to check whether they have sufficiently adapted their daily work to European trade secret protection frameworks to address unique challenges for cross-border intellectual property strategies. This explosive growth of AI capabilities is fundamentally changing how companies must protect their...

15/05/2025

The Dutch authority for the financial markets (AFM) recently published specific Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism (AML/CFT) regulations with which crypto-asset service providers (CASPs) are obliged to comply. What is the general AML/CTF framework for CASPs and what are the key points from the additional guidance issued...

02/06/2025

Fintech Cryptoassets updates FCA consults on proposed Handbook changes On 6 June 2025, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) published a consultation paper, covering minor miscellaneous proposed amendments to the Handbook, including to Chapter 4: lift the ban on the retail sale, marketing and distribution of cryptoasset exchange traded notes (cETNs)...

26/06/2025

The power of cloud services is extraordinarily flexible and can readily scale to meet demand, but this requires a huge amount of energy both to power the servers and to cool the data centres. Cloud-based digital technology underpins a significant proportion of green and clean tech. However, a high level...

25/01/2022

Thorough analysis of the combined dataset can lead to a deeper understanding of a group's customers, their needs and interests, with resulting benefits

14/06/2022

With regulation developing in US, China and India, European businesses with an appetite for global growth cannot ignore the data law landscape in other markets

14/06/2022

Data subject access requests (DSARs) often arise in the course of a termination of employment or a grievance procedure. A failure to respond to DSARs can leave businesses open to a higher level of administrative fines under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR): €20 million or up to 4% of...

9 mins

24/05/2022

The Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCAR) aims to create a comprehensive regulatory framework for certain crypto-assets, namely for stablecoins (being electronic money tokens or asset referenced tokens (ART)) and other crypto-assets that are not governed by existing financial EU law, such as utility tokens and – depending on details –...

21/04/2023

The Court of Justice of the European Union has delivered its judgment in Case C-604/22 IAB Europe v Gegevensbeschermingsautoriteit, involving questions around the processing of personal data by IAB Europe, the digital marketing and advertising association, through the use of its Transparency and Consent Framework (TCF). The framework is employed...

14/03/2024

The EU is steadily shaping the rules for artificial intelligence (AI) in medical technology, with new guidance designed to shed light on the evolving landscape. A question and answer (Q&A) document, which has been released jointly by the Medical Device Coordination Group (MDCG) and the Artificial Intelligence Board (AIB), explores...

30/06/2025

The House of Lords has introduced the Public Authority Algorithmic and Automated Decision-Making Systems Bill to help regulate the use of algorithms and automation in public sector decision-making processes. The private members' bill, introduced by Liberal Democrat peer Lord Clement-Jones on 9 September 2024, aims to respond to concerns about...

20/09/2024

The European Commission has published (28 June 2023) its proposal for a regulation on a framework for financial data access, along with proposals for a directive on payment services and electronic money services and a regulation on payment services in the internal market. This draft Open Finance Act aims to...

29/06/2023

The Polish Office of Competition and Consumer Protection (OCCP) is continuing its drive to engage actively in consumer protection law enforcement. In January, the president of the OCCP announced that he will examine how the market has adapted to new regulations resulting from implementation of the Omnibus directive. The competition...

15/02/2023

Online stores are gaining popularity among Polish internet users, especially when it comes to the purchase of clothing and accessories. The president of the Polish Office of Competition and Consumer Protection (OCCP) closely monitors the way these activities are conducted and whether online stores respect consumer protection regulations. Recently, OCCP...

04/04/2023