Computers & Law Online

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After our recent podcast episode on privacy and tech laws in Latin America, two of the guests, Bárbara Lazarotto and Luz Orozco, stayed behind to share some additional insights with the host, Mauricio Figueroa. Bárbara Lazarotto Can you share a bit of the work you do at the Brussels Privacy Hub? What is like day-to-day and…

Read More… from Privacy And Tech Laws In Latin America: An Interview with Barbara Lazarotto and Luz Orozco

Camilo Artiga-Purcell, General Counsel at Kiteworks, identifies some of the ever-increasing risks and potential consequences of rushing to use AI in legal practice Picture a partner at a leading UK law firm, racing to finalise a high-stakes merger. With a deadline looming, they turn to a free online AI tool, uploading sensitive deal documents for…

Read More… from AI Data Leaks & Shadow AI: The Legal Minefield Facing UK Organisations in 2025

Amanda Chaboryk, Chris Cartmell, and Stephanie Baker, of PwC, raise some early considerations about the seemingly inevitable spread of agentic AI into legal departments IntroductionArtificial Intelligence (AI) has played an increasingly prominent role within legal, starting as early as the 90’s, when legal databases started incorporating natural language processing to optimise search and retrieval. Leaping…

Read More… from The (Speculative) Rise of AI Agents in Legal

Lee Gluyas, Charlotte Sanderson and Stephanie Woods, from CMS, summarise the current thinking round tech disputes aired at the recent SCL Technology Disputes Masterclass How are technology disputes currently being resolved? Are traditional methods of dispute resolution suitable for resolving technology disputes? To what extent should new forms of dispute resolution be adopted to resolve…

Read More… from The Resolution of Technology Disputes: Present trends and future predictions

A team from Cripps reveal the perhaps surprising results of their research in to the political leanings of LLMs. In this article, Cripps’ specialist AI and Data team unpacks the political bias in generative artificial intelligence large language models (“LLMs”). We present the available research, explain our own test results and conclude that LLMs have…

Read More… from LLMs are Left-Leaning Liberals: The Hidden Political Bias of Large Language Models

Following consultation, Ofcom has published details about how it intends to set the fees and maximum penalties that will apply under the Online Safety Act. The Act specifies that the costs of Ofcom’s online safety work are to be funded by the tech companies it regulates. This is in line with how Ofcom is funded…

Read More… from Ofcom publishes approach for setting fees and maximum penalties under the Online Safety Act

The Competition and Markets Authority is proposing to designate Google with strategic market status (SMS) in general search and search advertising under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024. The CMA is consulting on the proposal before it makes a final decision in October. If designated, the CMA would be able to introduce targeted…

Read More… from CMA proposes to designate Google with strategic market status under the DMCC Act

Chinese courts take a different approach to the issue of AI generating copyright protected images, the DLA Piper team reports. On 7 March 2025, the Changshu People’s Court (in China’s Jiangsu province) announced that it had recently concluded a case on the topical issue of whether AI-generated works can be protected by copyright. In the…

Read More… from Another Chinese court finds that AI-generated images can be protected by copyright: the Changshu People’s Court and the ‘half heart’ case

The High Court has ruled in the case of RTM v Bonne Terre Ltd and Another EWHC 111 (KB).  The claimant RTM described himself as a recovering online gambling addict. He was a private individual with no national profile. He was anonymised in the litigation because of the risk that the privacy interests he was…

Read More… from High Court rules on targeting advertising to “recovering online gambling addict”

The Court of Justice of the European Union has ruled in Case C‑394/23 Mousse v CNIL and SNCF that asking customers to state their gender title (Mr or Ms) when buying train tickets is not necessary for the contract and may violate GDPR rules, especially the principle of data minimisation. Mousse (a LGTB association) complained…

Read More… from GDPR and rail transport: gender identity is not necessary data for the purchase of a transport ticket

Mauricio Figueroa summarises the key points from the SCL AI Conference hosted by Herbert Smith Freehills on 8th October. Practitioners, lawmakers, academics, trainees, in-house lawyers, and civil society representatives gathered at Herbert Smith Freehills’ offices in London for the annual Society for Computers and Law AI conference. The event brought together experts to explore the…

Read More… from The SCL AI Conference: Key Takeaways

Victor Gurr, Trainee Solicitor, Gisby Harrison Solicitors was nominated to attend the recent SCL 50th Anniversary Conference on 10 October 2023 as a tech law “rising star”.  “Rising stars” are invited to record their impressions of the Conference in any form they choose (in previous years these have been event reports, infographs and even poems!). These…

Read More… from SCL 50th Anniversary Conference 2023 – Rising Star Impression

What separates humanity from technology? The sudden omniscience of ChatGPT in November 2022 has prompted a good deal of philosophising on that question with the apparent gap between the human and the machine growing ever less defined. There is as yet little common ground on where the boundary lies but one oft cited difference is…

Read More… from SCL 50th Anniversary Conference Event Report: “The Dragon Under the Sofa and other stories”

Speakers Anita Bapat (Kemp Little LLP) Tom O’Flynn (Google) James Evan (Verizon media) Alex Abrahams (DMGT) Karishma Brahmbhatt (Allen & Overy LLP) Event Overview With ad-tech a key focus for data protection authorities such as the ICO and CNIL, panellists James, Alex and Tom methodically described ad-tech infrastructure, and the various players involved within the…

Read More… from Key Takeaways from the SCL Privacy and DP Group Event: Ad Tech – Bring Everyone to the Table