Category Archives: E-commerce

The wisdom of Max Schrems

Posted on November 18, 2020 by

I met Max Schrems at a seminar in a law school in the USA last year. He opened his remarks by saying in preparing his comments for the seminar he tried to talk to lawyers in the privacy community who … Continue reading →

Posted in Child abuse images, Default settings, E-commerce, Privacy, Regulation, Self-regulation | Tagged | 2 Comments

Nuremberg and the internet

Posted on November 2, 2020 by

Many people who read “East West Street” by Philippe Sands QC, may have been surprised to learn it was the horrors of the Second World War which propelled the international community – as represented by politicians, mainly elected ones – … Continue reading →

Posted in Child abuse images, Default settings, E-commerce, Internet governance, Privacy, Regulation, Self-regulation

Kids can’t pay for the truth

Posted on October 1, 2020 by

In many countries advertising revenues were vital in helping keep “old-fashioned” newspapers and other types of journals alive, particularly smaller, local ones. Typically these would be in printed form but they all soon had an online counterpart. In addition there … Continue reading →

Posted in Default settings, E-commerce, Privacy, Regulation, Self-regulation

Let’s not make TWO mistakes

Posted on September 27, 2020 by

Nobody had spotted it. The European Commission openly acknowledged an error had been made. If left uncorrected it would bring to an end measures which have been protecting kids since 2009. On 10th September the Commission published a proposal.  It … Continue reading →

Posted in Default settings, E-commerce, Facebook, Google, Regulation, Self-regulation

Children’s groups speak out

Posted on September 9, 2020 by

The EU held a consultation on the upcoming Digital Services Act. It closed yesterday. Here is a link to the document I submitted with the support of one or more children’s groups from 15 Member States. What with the holiday … Continue reading →

Posted in Age verification, Child abuse images, Consent, Default settings, E-commerce, Internet governance, Pornography, Privacy, Regulation, Self-regulation

Facebook’s very poor example

Posted on July 25, 2020 by

I have lost count of the number of times child safety advocates from around the world have got in touch with me because, in relation to something they think is important and urgent locally, they cannot get any response from … Continue reading →

Posted in E-commerce, Facebook, Regulation, Self-regulation

Something could be done now?

Posted on June 21, 2020 by

If you click here you will see a copy of a letter I sent today to Information Commissioner, Elizabeth Denham CBE, the UK’s chief privacy enforcement official. In the letter I suggest the fact that the Government called a halt … Continue reading →

Posted in Advertising, Age verification, E-commerce, Pornography, Regulation, Self-regulation

Good but nowhere near good enough

Posted on May 27, 2020 by

Last Thursday Facebook made an announcement about its plans for Messenger. In truth the substance of the announcement concerned great stuff I thought they were already doing, at least on their main Facebook platform, so discovering they were now going … Continue reading →

Posted in Child abuse images, E-commerce, Facebook, Privacy, Regulation, Self-regulation

Failures of contingency planning worsened by delay

Posted on May 18, 2020 by

UK Children’s organizations have written a letter of protest to the Government. The media have covered in some detail certain headline failures of contingency planning in relation to Covid-19 and lockdown. Less well remarked has been the failure of contingency … Continue reading →

Posted in Age verification, Consent, Default settings, E-commerce, Facebook, Google, Privacy, Regulation, Self-regulation

Another advertising scandal

Posted on May 2, 2020 by

Apologies for the fact I missed this at the time it hit the regular news cycle but when I read  about it yesterday I felt I still had to write something. Regular readers will know my blogs are occasionally partly … Continue reading →

Posted in E-commerce, Facebook, Google, Pornography, Regulation, Self-regulation