The US president has issued an executive order asking various US regulatory agencies to prepare a range of reports on various regulatory issues, ranging from central bank digital currencies to consumer protection.
Data Act: Proposal for a Regulation on harmonised rules on fair access to and use of data | Shaping Europe’s digital future
The European Commission’s Data Act aims to maximize the value of data in the economy by ensuring that a wider range of stakeholders gain control over their data and that more data is available for innovative use, while preserving incentives to invest in data generation.
Levelling Up the United Kingdom
The Government of UK has released a whitepaper addressing geographic, demographic, economic, and social inequalities. The model is anchored around an ambitious set of missions, galvanising action across sectors to improve jobs, incomes, health, skills, transport, pride in place, safety and well-being across the UK.
Declaration on European Digital Rights and Principles
The European Commission is proposing to define a set of principles for a human-centred digital transformation. This European Declaration on Digital rights and principles would be a reference framework for people, and a guide for businesses and policy-makers.
Plan focuses on digital economy development during 14th Five-Year Plan period
China will further promote the development of a digital economy during the 14th Five-Year Plan (2021-25) period, according to a circular issued by the General Office of the State Council on Jan 12, 2022.
By 2025, the digital economy should be in full expansion mode, with the added value of core industries in the digital economy accounting for 10 percent of GDP.
Meanwhile, digital innovation should play a bigger role in leading economic development with significant progress in the intelligent level and integration between digital technology and the real economy.
A better digital economy governance system and a more competitive digital economy are also expected, according to the circular.
According to the plan, efforts will be made to accelerate the construction of the information network infrastructure, and a national-level integrated big data center system coordinating computing power, algorithms, data, and application resources.
High quality data elements will be provided.
Market entities will be encouraged to collect data in accordance with the law. Data resources processing will be improved and the data service industry will be fostered and expanded.
In addition, market-based circulation of data elements will be promoted. Furthermore, new mechanisms for the development and utilization of data elements will be developed.
The plan also emphasized industrial digital transformation.
To accelerate digital transformation and upgrading in enterprises, qualified large-scale enterprises will be encouraged to build integrated digital platforms.
Efforts will also be made to deepen comprehensive digital transformation in key industries, including all-around and full-chain digital transformation of traditional industries and higher digitization level in the agricultural industry.
The circular also urged promoting digital transformation of industrial parks and clusters.
It stresses enhancing innovation of key technologies in strategic and forward-looking fields such as quantum information, network communications, integrated circuits, key software, big data, artificial intelligence, block-chain, and new materials, among others.
Core industries should be more competitive, such as basic software and hardware, core electronic components, key basic materials and production equipment. And key products should be more self-sufficient.
New business forms and models will be fostered.
Digitization of public services is also an important issue, the circular said, and efforts will be made to improve the efficiency of Internet Plus government services, and ensure digital social services benefit more people.
The plan decided to promote construction of smart cities and digital villages, as smart parking lots, smart charging centers, and smart dustbins will be encouraged in newly built residential areas.
A sound digital economy governance system will be established with the participation of governments, platforms, enterprises, industrial organizations, and the general public, according to the circular.
International cooperation and data and network security are also stressed in the circular.
S. Korea passes bill to curb sway of Google, Apple in app store fees
South Korean lawmakers voted to approve amendments to the Telecommunications Business Act that prohibit app market operators from coercing mobile content businesses into using specific payment systems through the use of market power.
China’s draft regulation of algorithms
China’s cybersecurity agency recently announced comprehensive draft guidelines governing the use of recommendation algorithms. The proposal is out for feedback through September 26, with no implementation date mentioned at this stage.
The regulations in Mandarin can be translated using a browser translation tool.
Climate Change 2021 The Physical Science Basis Summary for Policymakers
The Sixth IPCC Assessment Report released on August 9 advances our understanding of the global climate system and climate change. It brings together the most recent advances in climate science and integrates multiple sources of evidence to provide a comprehensive view of the climate.
The summary for policymakers offers evidence on how the climate is changing due to human influence. It also presents possible climate futures under different mitigation scenarios of human-induced climate change.
We need to regulate mind-reading tech before it exists – Rest of World
Two measures in Chile will establish neuro-rights for Chileans: a constitutional reform bill that is seeking ratification by the Chamber of Deputies, and a bill on neuro-protection. Personal identity, free will, mental privacy, equal access to cognitive improvement technologies, and protection against algorithmic bias are among these rights.
Chile’s new “mental privacy” laws would lead the way in protecting neuro-rights.
Agreement on taxing global tech companies
Apple creates products in California, contracts Foxconn to manufacture them in China using Japanese and Korean components, sells them in Germany, and records revenue in Ireland. Where is the profit made and how is it taxed? This has always been a problem, but it has gotten worse in recent decades, exacerbated by the emergence of extremely large global technology companies and countries competing on lower corporate tax rates. Now, the OECD has reached a preliminary global agreement on a new set of rules covering profit allocation and establishing a global minimum tax rate of 15%.
G7 Finance Ministers Agree on a Historic Global Tax Agreement
On June 5, the G7 Finance Ministers agreed on a minimum corporate tax of 15%. This agreement is to avoid a race to the bottom in giving tax concessions to multinationals and respond to some of the challenges of globalization and digitization.
USA’s infrastructure push
The US government is planning to spend roughly $2 trillion on infrastructure and economic recovery. The planned spending includes investments in transportation infrastructure, renewal of electricity grids, water systems, broadband and manufacturing, among other goals.
See the Factsheet on the American Jobs Plan put out by the Whitehouse.
Australia’s legislative push to have tech platforms pay for news
Australia’s move to have digital platforms to pay for news has been very much in the public view. Its Treasury Laws Amendment (News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code) Bill 2020 allows for the bargaining of amounts to be paid for news content from registered Australian news business corporations by designated platform services. This issue will have repercussions beyond Australia, and needs to be closely followed.
Disinformation
Dealing with disinformation has become critical in the light of developments around the US Presidential election.
Brookings Techstream, has published an interesting piece on How disinformation evolved in 2020. The Oxford Internet Institute has a report on the role of computational propaganda: Industrialized Disinformation: 2020 Global Inventory of Organized Social Media Manipulation.
The role of social media in spreading disinformation
The US House of Representatives held a hearing last month regarding the disinformation on social media platforms that contributed to the storming of the US Capitol Building on January 6. The CEO of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg suggested some reforms to Section 230 of the Computer Decency Act that provides protections to technology platforms.
The New York Times report on the hearings can be seen here.
Metaverse
David Baszuki, CEO and Founder of Roblox has authored a piece in Wired, The Metaverse is Coming. A metaverse is a shared, persistent virtual space. The question of how a metaverse will be regulated will become important in the days ahead. Regulatory issues include for example data ownership and privacy. Facebook’s take on privacy can be seen here.