cearta.ie – Page 35 – the Irish for rights

This week’s Economist is uncharacteristically effusive about the blockchain. On the cover, it calls it “The Trust Machine”, and says that it is a technology that “could change the world”.

In a lead article, it explains that the

blockchain lets people who have no particular confidence in each other collaborate without having to go through a neutral central authority. Simply put, it is a machine for creating trust. … it is a shared, trusted, public ledger that everyone can inspect, but which no single user controls.

The decentralized cryptocurrency, Bitcoin, is the context in which the first blockchain has been developed. That blockchain keeps a continuous, almost real-time, track of currency transactions, and prevents double-spending. Although this is one use to which the blockchain concept can be put, the Economist emphasizes that there are countless other applications:

One idea, for example is to make cheap, tamper-proof public databases … [such as] registers of the ownership of luxury goods or works or art.

Just as I don’t have to understand the workings of the internal combustion engine to drive a car or take a bus, or understand the workings of a processor to use a laptop or a smartphone, I don’t have to understand the workings of the cryptography at the heart of the blockchain to spend a bitcoin or confirm the ownership of a good.…

Full Breach Damages in data protection cases – the impact of Vidal-Hall on Collins v FBD

13 June, 20154 December, 2020

| 7 Comments

| Privacy

The Court of Appeal decision in Google Inc v Vidal-Hall [2015] EWCA Civ 311 (27 March 2015) (Dyson MR and Sharp LJ in a joint judgment; McFarlane LJ concurring), affirming the judgment of Tugendhat J (at [2014] EWHC 13 (QB) (16 January 2014)), is a very important decision on damages for invasion of privacy, and it raises significant questions about the correctness of of Feeney J’s reasoning in the earlier Irish case of Collins v FBD Insurance plc [2013] IEHC 137 (14 March 2013).

The three claimants alleged that the defendant had tracked and collated private information about the their internet usage via their Apple Safari browser without their knowledge and consent, contrary to the defendant’s publicly stated position that such activity could not be conducted for Safari users unless they had expressly allowed it to happen (much of the technical and regulatory background is set out here by Alexander Hanff; and Judith Vidal-Hall explains here and here how she came to take on the giant that is Google). The Court held that the claimants could maintain claims against the defendant, in tort for misuse of private information, and for compensation pursuant section 13 of the Data Protection Act, 1998.…

Judicial review and the exclusive jurisdiction of University Visitors

9 June, 201513 June, 2015

| 3 Comments

| Litigation, Universities

Institutions such as cathedrals and colleges are often overseen by Visitors. The recent decision of Horner J in In re CS [2015] NIQB 36 (30 April 2015) has reaffirmed many basic principles relating to the jurisdiction of University Visitors.

In Ireland, section 19 of the Universities Act, 1997 (also here) provides for Visitors for Irish universities. Hence, for example, in Trinity, the Visitors hear internal appeals against decisions of the Board and other bodies in College. If there is no such decision, the Visitors have no jurisdiction on this ground (Kelly v TCD [2007] IESC 61 (14 December 2007)). And, if they have jurisdiction, the hearing is not a review but a full appeal where they will look afresh at the matters in dispute and form their own views (R v Visitors to the Inns of Court, ex p Calder & Persaud [1994] QB 1, [1993] 2 All ER 876).

The exclusive jurisdiction of Visitors, rather than the courts, to make such internal determinations has been established by an unvarying line of authority from Philips v Bury (1694) Shower PC 35, (1694) 1 ER 24, [1694] EngR 11 (1 January 1694) (pdf) and Bracken v Visitors of the College of William & Mary 3 Call (7 Va) 573 (1790) [noted Bridge 20 Wm & Mary L Rev 415 (1979)], to Thomas v University of Bradford [1987] AC 795 (HL) (.doc…

French reform of Contract Law in comparative context

8 June, 20158 December, 2015

| 1 Comment

| Comparative Law, Contract

I recently came across a special issue of the ELTE Law Journal to celebrate the tenth anniversary of Hungary’s accession to the EU. The journal is published by the Faculty of Law and Political Sciences in Hungary’s oldest university, Eötvös Loránd University (ELTE) in Budapest, and one article in the issue particularly caught my eye (with added links):

Bénédicte Fauvarque-Cosson “The French Contract Law Reform in a European Context” (2014) ELTE Law Journal 59

I Introductory Remarks on the Development of the Law in Europe
… The civil and commercial law of each Member State is built upon three pillars, the national legal systems, EU law and the ECHR. While our national experiences influence one another, the law of the EU is built upon these reciprocal influences. In turn, our national legal systems are influenced by EU law. …

As European scholars, our role is primarily to train students to think comparatively, in order to build a common legal culture all over Europe … As European lawyers in the 21st century, our mission goes beyond comparative teaching. … Legal scholarship has played its role as a guide to the European legislator. … The same phenomenon may be observed in those of our countries where the recodification of important parts of the law is envisaged.

…

Neuberger on politics and law – Update – Magna Carta and the Holy Grail

15 May, 20159 June, 2015

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| Conferences, Lectures, Papers and Workshops

I recently blogged here about the speech Lord Neuberger, President of the UK Supreme Court, delivered to the DU Law Society on Friday, 6 March 2015. The full text of his speech is now available here (pdf) so you can judge for yourself how accurate my notes are.

Two forthcoming events relating to Magna Carta are of Irish relevance. First, my TCD colleague Peter Crooks will deliver a paper on “Magna Carta in Ireland” to the Magna Carta Conference, which will be held in King’s College London and the British Library, from 17-19 June 2015. Second, an exhibition on Magna Carta is coming soon to Christ Church cathedral, Dublin. I am sure I will return to both of these events on the blog in due course. Meanwhile, I notice that Lord Neuberger has returned to the topic, in a speech entitled “Magna Carta and the Holy Grail”, which he delivered in Lincoln’s Inn, London, on 12 May 2015. It is available here (pdf); a flavour (with added links):

16. … One school sees what happened at Runnymede [where Magna Carta was signed and sealed by King John on 12 June 1215] as little more than a dramatic moment of history which has captured the public imagination [see, for example, the memorial at Runnymede, pictured above left], and which only has symbolic importance due to the subsequent accidents of history.

…

On World Press Freedom Day, Ireland ranks at number 11

3 May, 2015

| 1 Comment

| Freedom of Expression

On World Press Freedom Day, the Reporters Without Borders/Reporters sans frontières 2015 World Press Freedom Index, Ireland is ranked at number 11 (up from 16 last year). World Press Freedom Day was proclaimed by the UN General Assembly in December 1993, and is celebrated worldwide on 3 May, the anniversary of the Declaration of Windhoek (1991) which declared:

… the establishment, maintenance and fostering of an independent, pluralistic and free press is essential to the development and maintenance of democracy in a nation, and for economic development.

…

QUB Charlie Hebdo event will go ahead, after all

3 May, 20153 May, 2015

| 1 Comment

| Freedom of Expression, Universities

Queen’s University Belfast has posted the following update on its Facebook page:

Following the completion of a comprehensive risk assessment, undertaken in line with approved protocols, the University is pleased to confirm that the Charlie Hebdo Research Symposium, organised by the Institute for Collaborative Research in the Humanities has been approved.

There’s a shorter version on twitter. It is in line with a statement issued by Queen’s that they would carry out such an assessment. This is excellent news. Having blogged about its cancellation (here and here), I’m delighted that the Institute will get to run its symposium on entitled “Understanding Charlie: New perspectives on contemporary citizenship after Charlie Hebdo”. The Little Atoms site, which initially broke the news of the cancellation, welcomed the volte-face:

Belfast university Charlie Hebdo conference WILL go ahead

Victory for academic freedom as cancelled symposium is reinstated

… Jo Glanville, director of free speech advocacy group English PEN, welcomed Queen’s University’s decision, telling Little Atoms: “It’s very good news that the conference is now going ahead. We need as much opportunity for debate as possible at a time when the ability to exercise the right to freedom of expression remains highly vulnerable.”

…

The fall of Saigon and Snepp v US

2 May, 20153 May, 2015

| 1 Comment

| Freedom of Expression, Restitution, US Supreme Court

Saigon was the capital of South Vietnam, and its fall to the North Vietnamese 40 years ago this week, on 30 April 1975, effectively ended the Vietnam War. The image, left, is often taken as panic-stricken US citizens on the roof of the US Embassy trying to board the last helicopter out of Saigon. In fact, although there Many images images of the Embassy on that fateful day, the building in this famous photo is an apartment complex at 22 Gia Long Street; the people fleeing are Vietnamese; it was taken on 29 April; and the last helicopter took off at 07:53am the following day. Saigon is now Ho Chi Minh City, the largest city in the Socialist Republic of Viet Nam, where the war now seems like a very distant memory, the US has been slower to learn the foreign policy lessons.

Reading about this anniversary this week brought to mind the case of Snepp v US 444 US 507 (1980). Frank Snepp was a member of the CIA in Saigon during the Vietnam War, and was one of the last Americans to leave the city as it fell to the North Vietnamese in 1975.…