When Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Web in 1990, he envisaged a decentralised environment of free exchange of ideas and information. Fast forward to 2019, almost 30 years later, and that online environment has been polluted by disinformation, manipulation, harassment and privacy breaches. The growth of online pollution has prompted various regulatory responses such as the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation1, Germany’s Network Enforcement Act2, Australia’s Abhorrent Violence Amendment Bill3 and California’s Consumer Privacy Act4, each one responding to an online safety problem. In a world first, however, the UK has signalled it will regulate online safety in a single and coherent way, including creating a statutory duty of care for online safety. This howtoregulate article will analyse the UK’s regulatory approach outlined in its April 2019 Online Harms White Paper, which is open for public consultation until July 2019, and propose ways to improve on regulatory enforcement of online safety. Continue reading Regulating online safety and tackling online harms
All posts by Regulatory Institute
Life after death: regulating posthumous reproduction
Regulating posthumous reproduction raises a myriad of bioethical, social, legal and administrative issues, all of which are important in any drafting of regulation on the topic. Very few jurisdictions researched in this howtoregulate article had complete legislation that regulated well the issues that arise from the retrieval of reproductive tissue postmortem and subsequent posthumous use of such tissue. In some jurisdictions researched, the applicable legislation was somewhat dated in comparison to the advances made in artificial reproductive technology (ART) treatment that push the boundaries of the legal parent. This howtoregulate article explores how jurisdictions have regulated posthumous reproduction, citing examples of regulation where they existed and proposing areas requiring clarity. Continue reading Life after death: regulating posthumous reproduction
How to regulate sensitive products when regulatory resources are limited
This howtoregulate article analyses how countries with limited regulatory resources could regulate sensitive products, using the example of medical devices. A key component of regulating such sensitive products is recognising certificates and evaluations from stringent jurisdictions, so that scarce government resources can be focussed on other regulatory activities such as customs control and enforcement. Continue reading How to regulate sensitive products when regulatory resources are limited
Infectious diseases: how to regulate an agile system equipped for the unknown
This howtoregulate article explores the regulation of infectious diseases, an issue of global importance noting that an outbreak from any infectious disease is just a plane ride away. Global climate change has contributed to increases in vector-borne diseases1 and zoonotic diseases2, as animals move to populated areas in search of food. The World Health Organisation even has a placeholder for future unknown diseases (Disease X) on its list for determining which diseases and pathogens3 to prioritise for research. Evidently, effective public health regulations are critical for the effective surveillance, early detection and prevention of infectious diseases. Continue reading Infectious diseases: how to regulate an agile system equipped for the unknown
Regulating Cross Border Services
In today’s globalised world, where markets are increasingly borderless, how does the domestic regulator enforce national objectives in consumer protection, professional standards, taxes and competition? Let’s be honest, it’s not easy to enforce these objectives within the border, imagine across borders, where the language and legal systems are different and, most importantly, there is no own state power of the jurisdiction setting up requirements. Cross-border product enforcement has matured in recent years in line with consumer demand for quality and stricter enforcement through customs and sometimes even postal services. Requirements for cross-border services, however, have been more difficult to enforce due to the variety of channels that services consumers and businesses currently use, particularly digital services. This howtoregulate article focuses on how the regulation of cross-border services could be better enforced so that compliance with service requirements by traders outside of the jurisdiction are similar, or at least not too dissimilar, to those within the regulator’s jurisdiction. Continue reading Regulating Cross Border Services
Regulating alcohol consumption in the absence of a medically determined safe level
According to The Lancet “alcohol use is a leading risk factor for global disease burden and causes substantial health loss”1. In fact, it is the seventh leading risk factor globally for mortality and disease finding that “the risk of all-cause mortality, and of cancers specifically, rises with increasing levels of consumption, and the level of consumption that minimises health loss is zero”2. These results suggest that alcohol control policies and regulations that have traditionally focused on “responsible” or “safe” alcohol consumption might need to be revised worldwide, refocusing on efforts to lower overall population-level consumption. Some states (eg. Australia) are currently reviewing their alcohol control regime and with The Lancet’s recent publication more jurisdictions are expected to follow. This howtoregulate article examines the international and national alcohol control regulations to determine good regulatory techniques that could assist states’ reviews of existing regulation. Continue reading Regulating alcohol consumption in the absence of a medically determined safe level
Report on Artificial Intelligence: Part II – outline of future regulation of AI
This Part II of the howtoregulate Report on Artificial Intelligence presents regulatory approaches for minimising the harms of artificial intelligence (AI), evidently without putting into question the utility of AI. What should regulation of AI look like? The answer to this question depends on the goals of the regulator. As was previously outlined in Part I, much of the goals of states today is to focus on incentivising innovative applications of AI or encouraging break through AI research. We could imagine, however, that the average regulator might also consider such goals as avoiding the risk that AI research or technology leads to the eradication of humankind and reducing other major risks for human beings to the extent that the expected positive effect of AI is not disproportionately hampered. Furthermore, regulators might feel compelled to deal with particular risks linked to specific technological uses. Continue reading Report on Artificial Intelligence: Part II – outline of future regulation of AI
Report on Artificial Intelligence: Part I – the existing regulatory landscape
Artificial intelligence (AI) has been placed front and centre in many countriesʼ economic strategies1, probably unsurprising as AI is one of the defining technologies of the Fourth Industrial Revolution2. Nascent AI regulation around the world today is characterised by soft approaches either aimed at incentivising innovation in the manufacturing or digital sectors or encouraging break through research. The ethical implications of AI are either regulated through specific AI codes in companies concerned with good corporate social responsibility, in research institutes (private or public) concerned with ethical research and innovation or not regulated at all. These AI ethical codes are not formally scrutinised by any public administration, nor are they legislatively required, and so it is difficult to assess the quality and effectiveness of such codes in minimising the negative implications of AI. The purpose of this howtoregulate report is to examine existing AI regulatory landscape (Part I) and present regulatory approaches for minimising the harms of AI (Part II – outline for future regulation of AI), evidently without putting into question the utility of AI. Continue reading Report on Artificial Intelligence: Part I – the existing regulatory landscape
Tobacco control regulations: Combating the world´s leading preventable cause of death
Tobacco remains the leading preventable cause of death in the world today and accounts for around 12% of all adult deaths worldwide (more than 7 million people)1. Its effects are far-reaching and has implications along the supply chain: from the land used to grow tobacco instead of food, often in countries where food security is a concern, to the 63% of children of tobacco-growing families involved in child labour, to the environmental effects of smoke expelled into the air, the bystander and the smoker´s health2. This howtoregulate article focuses on tobacco control regulation and regulation for the emerging tobacco alternative electronic cigarettes. Continue reading Tobacco control regulations: Combating the world´s leading preventable cause of death
Countering “fake news”
Waves of parliament´s around the world are looking into the problem of “fake news”, including the UK Parliament1 (Green Paper: Internet Safety Strategy and Fake News Inquiry), the US Senate2 and the Singaporean Parliament3 (Green Paper: Deliberate Online Falsehoods). In early January 2018, the French President Macron said he would present a new law in order to fight the spread of “fake news”, which he said threatened democracies4. The Canadian Communications Security Establishment (CSE), in its report Cyber Threats to Canada´s Democratic Process, the first threat assessment of this kind in the world to be shared with the public said the Canadian Minister of Democratic Institutions5, states that: Continue reading Countering “fake news”