The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has recently published its response to the news that political agreement has been reached on a new EU-US Privacy Shield to replace the Safe Harbor.
Most of what the ICO has to say will no longer be news to those that are following developments in the field closely, but the tone is calm, clear and reassuring, and this blog post provides a useful summary of where we are now in relation to the Safe Harbor.
I was delighted to hear that our feature article in this month’s PLC Magazine has already attracted a lot of attention. Cyber security issues need to be placed on the board agenda sooner rather than later, and before a cyber breach occurs, not as a result of one. For further information, see our practice page.
Last week Thomson Reuters hosted a seminar entitled Modern Slavery, Bribery and Corruption: Corporate Compliance with Legal Frameworks which coincided with the publication of two reports on the connection between modern Slavery and corruption from Verité and Liberty Asia.
An eminent panel including Nick Grono, CEO of the Freedom Fund, Dan Viederman, CEO of Verité, Duncan Jepson , CEO of Liberty Asia, Martina Vandenberg, Founder and President of the Human Trafficking Pro Bono Legal Center and Mike Harris from World-Check discussed the findings of these reports and answered questions from a varied audience of in-house, legal and risk officers and academics.
The Supreme Court has provided helpful clarification on the scope of section 171 of the Companies Act 2006 (CA 2006) in Eclairs Group Ltd and Glengary Overseas Ltd v JKX Oil & Gas plc [2015] UKSC 71. Continue reading
In recent years, there has been considerable government intervention in whistleblowing. Responding to the perception that whistleblowing legislation was being exploited as a means of avoiding the compensatory cap for unfair dismissal claims, the government introduced a requirement that a disclosure is not protected unless it is reasonably believed to be made in the public interest.
In 2015, more retailers than ever in the UK followed the lead of their US counterparts by running promotions on “Black Friday” and “Cyber Monday”, days that have become associated with frenzied bargain hunters seizing televisions and other goods, at unbelievable prices. As a result, retail sales slowed in December, so retailers attempted to extend that Black Friday “fever” by lining up new “not to be missed” offers in the important days leading up to Christmas. Many traditional Boxing Day sales started online even before Downton Abbey was on, with Amazon’s sale starting at 4pm on Christmas Day.
The most pressing issue for in-house lawyers in retail is embedding the right process before, during and after critical sales promotions to ensure that they can drive sales without eroding customer goodwill or attracting the bad feeling that leads to complaints to the Advertising Standards Agency (ASA) and the bad publicity that accompanies such complaints.
For the first time last week, a criminal court considered a failure by a company to prevent corruption under the Bribery Act 2010 (section 7) and approved the UK SFO’s first Deferred Prosecution Agreement (DPA). The case generated such interest that the public hearing on Monday had to be moved to a bigger courtroom to accommodate scores of lawyers and journalists (even then Practical Law’s own Morag Rea had to sit on the floor).
I was delighted to Chair the 2015 Future of Data Protection Forum last month. It was an exciting day full of interesting debates and practical takeaways for privacy practitioners.
While passing through immigration control on my last visit to the United States, I was asked the usual question: “Are you travelling for business or pleasure?” “Business”, I answered, “I’m speaking at a conference.” “What are you speaking about?” queried the immigration officer. “Well”, I answered, frantically trying to condense into a nutshell the content of my next three days’ workshops, “I’m trying to teach lawyers to be less like lawyers and more like real people.”
A recent High Court decision has provided reassurance to both lawyers and clients as to the scope of legal advice privilege (LAP), after an earlier decision (by a different judge) in the same case had arguably suggested a narrower scope for LAP than had been generally accepted.