Inline Insights

In November 2023 the UK Government outlined its regulatory intentions for the cryptocasset industry. In this blog, we summarise the UK Government’s plans for the future regulation of cryptoassets and explain the next steps.

The Online Safety Bill was introduced in March 2022 to make the UK the ‘safest place in the world to be online’. After a long journey through Parliament, the Bill passed its final parliamentary stages on Tuesday 19 September and was granted royal assent on 26 October 2023, meaning it is now enshrined in law as the Online Safety Act (OSA). However, companies will not have to comply with most of the Act’s provisions immediately. Rather, many details are yet to be set out via secondary legislation and guidance. In this blog post, we take a look at the next steps under the UK’s new online safety regime.   

This is one of a series of blogs on how public policy is made in the UK. In this first blog, we look at how policies are created and what happens before they are brought to Parliament as a legislative bill.

Are consumers being deceived by misleading environmental and sustainability claims about products and services? "Greenwashing" is getting increasing attention from EU policymakers.  What is the European Union doing to combat "greenwashing" by companies? How does this impact businesses and what should companies expect?

This blog is based on Inline’s panel discussion “EU short-term rentals regulation: where should compromise between the EU institutions lie?” which took place in April 2023. The event brought together Ivars Ijabs MEP, Shadow Rapporteur for the STR Regulation in the European Parliament’s Internal Market and Consumer Protection - IMCO Committee; Inge Janssen, Director Public Affairs, EMEA at Booking.com and Chair of EU travel tech; and Amaryllis Verhoeven, Head of the Digital Transformation of Industry Unit at DG GROW, European Commission. You can find a recording of the event here.

President Biden, in his State of the Union address laid out his vision for this year. In this blog, Inline Policy will highlight the key tech policy issues on which the Administration and the federal government are focused.

The Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation will establish rules on the production of goods that are sold in the EU market. These rules will cover the entire life cycle of a product, from its design to its recycling. Companies which build tech devices and online platforms which sell those devices to consumers will have new obligations.

On 7 November 2022, the European Commission published a proposal for a Regulation on data collection and sharing relating to short-term rentals. The proposed Regulation aims to establish a framework to share data between online platforms, hosts and public authorities. This blog analyses the two most pertinent parts of the proposed Regulation; it identifies the aspects that may cause friction; and it suggests how this friction could be addressed by policymakers.

Sweden assumed the Presidency of the Council of the EU on 1 January and presented its policy programme on Tuesday 17 January to the European Parliament. The programme focuses on competitiveness, security, rule of law and sustainability. In this article, we examine the digital and sustainable priorities outlined in the programme. The Swedish Presidency is expected to drive progress in areas such as cyber security, data sharing, digital identity, and sustainability.

The European Commission has proposed new rules providing compensation for damage caused by AI systems. Below, we summarise the two key instruments which users and providers of AI systems will need to comply with.

Chancellor of the Exchequer Jeremy Hunt has published his Autumn Statement, outlining the UK Government’s fiscal policies for the next five years. The statement includes a number of measures of interest for the tech sector, which we summarise below.

Once again, the UK has a new Prime Minister. What does this further leadership change mean for the UK’s tech ecosystem and regulatory environment? In this blog, Inline Policy illuminates where a Rishi Sunak premiership could land on issues such as digital competition, data protection, online safety, net zero, artificial intelligence, innovation, and foreign relations.  

The European Union’s Digital Markets Act (DMA) is set to establish a concrete list of dos and don’ts for the world’s biggest digital platforms when operating in the EU. These include hitherto absent ‘ex ante’ regulations to provide more fairness in the area of antitrust issues. Quite simply, the DMA aims to level the digital market’s playing field to ensure that smaller firms can operate under fairer competition.

Liz Truss is the new UK Prime Minister. Her premiership is likely to mean broad continuity with the previous government’s tech policy of making the UK a technology superpower, but with a renewed focus following the drift of the last few months of the Johnson premiership. This offers opportunities for tech firms, but they should be alert for a possible deterioration in UK-EU relations. In this blog we explore the impact of the new administration on the key tech policy areas.

The Online Safety Bill is the UK Government’s flagship piece of digital regulation, the British equivalent of the EU’s Digital Services Act. Prior to Boris Johnson’s resignation and the ensuing fallout, there were hopes that the bill would clear the House of Commons before parliamentary recess began on 22 July 2022. However, due to the distractions caused by the Prime Minister’s resignation, the bill still has several parliamentary stages before it becomes law , and could face further revision, depending on which one of Liz Truss or Rishi Sunak becomes the next Prime Minister. In this blog, Inline asks: what next for the Online Safety Bill?

Last week, EU and US policymakers met in Paris to discuss trade and technology related issues. Despite some progress on Russia, trade, and sustainability, the two sides remain far apart on the question of how to regulate Big Tech.

The Queen’s Speech on 10 May 2022 outlines all the Bills that the Government intends to introduce in the new Parliamentary session. It includes substantial tech policy reforms in areas in which the UK is diverging from EU policy for the first time. While there are various initiatives, they can broadly be categorised as, first, pro-innovation and pro-competition measures, and secondly, changes to improve the protection of consumers of tech. Here we take you through the main proposals.

The three EU institutions - Commission, Parliament and Council of the EU - reached a provisional agreement on the Digital Services Act, (DSA) on 22 April 2022. In this briefing we highlight its main provisions and their implications for companies, particularly regarding compliance and future regulatory ramifications.

As the European Union seeks to achieve zero-emission road transport in cities, we explore what proposals on infrastructure, multi-modal travel and mobility data mean for passengers, industry, and other stakeholders.

Inline’s previous blog explored the UK Government’s aspirations for the technology and digital sectors and its legislative plans to make the UK a global leader in the space. In this blog, we look at the organisations responsible for regulating the UK’s tech sector, focusing on their powers and for which areas they have responsibility. We highlight some of the regulatory issues that these regulators are dealing with and which we advise tech companies should monitor.