When war breaks out among the political class, as it has over Brexit, journalists are bound to get excited. It works the other way, too: excitement among journos puts the wind up the politicos. Accordingly, in recent weeks, their frenzied interaction blew a perfect storm across College Green, the media’s favoured haunt outside the Palace of Westminster. Read the rest of this entry »
Earlier this summer, some of the world’s biggest tech, product and branding companies (including Google, Facebook, Unilever and Procter & Gamble) launched The Global Alliance for Responsible Media. This self-described ‘unprecedented’ alliance aims to tackle ‘dangerous, hateful, disruptive and fake content online’ which it says, if left unchecked, ‘risks threatening our global community’. Read the rest of this entry »
Apple recently released a statement on its development of automated assistant Siri’s privacy protections. The result is a move towards doing everything right in safeguarding consumer privacy. When compared to Amazon’s protections for its Alexa service market shifts and best practice become clear, making for better adherence to the seven data protection principles underpinning the GDPR. Read the rest of this entry »
The increasing encroachment of audio-activated devices into our personal lives presents unique privacy challenges. Recent events have prompted the review of how audio-activated devices collect, store, transmit and use data, prompting concern and highlighting a number of long term lessons to be learned. Read the rest of this entry »
The legal year in England and Wales ended on 31 July 2019. The High Court, the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court are now on vacation until Michaelmas Term begins on 1 October 2019. Our Table of Media Law cases records 57 judgments in media law cases this legal year. Read the rest of this entry »
The latest photo app craze can make you look like a movie star. Zao uses artificial intelligence to replace the faces of characters in film or TV clips with images of anyone whose photo you upload to the app. Read the rest of this entry »
On 21 August 2019, Phineas Mojapelo, the Deputy Judge President of the South Gauteng Division of the High Court in the case of, Nelson Mandela Foundation Trusts v Afriforum NPC ([2019] ZAEQC 2) ruled that the display of the pre-1994 South African flag – the apartheid flag – constitutes hate speech. Read the rest of this entry »
Summer is winding down, and policymakers in Brussels are returning to an ambitious task: drafting new regulation for the Internet. Meanwhile, in Luxembourg, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) is deciding cases that will affect both Internet platforms’ operations and lawmakers’ choices in devising new laws. Read the rest of this entry »
Journalists, politicians, academics, and governments all agree that the problem of news manipulation needs to be addressed, even if no one seems to be able to agree on what to call it. The terms ‘fake news’, ‘misinformation’, ‘disinformation’, and ‘propaganda’ are all used interchangeably. Read the rest of this entry »
On 4 September 2019 the Administrative Court (Haddon-Cave LJ and Swift J) handed down judgment in the case of R (Bridges) v Chief Constable of the South Wales Police [2019] EWHC 2341 (Admin). The Court held that it was lawful for the police to use automated facial recognition software (“AFR”). Read the rest of this entry »
