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The collection of all scholarly commentary on law, economics, and more

Showing archive for:  “Privacy & Data Security”

The FTC UMC Roundup – Welcome to June Edition

Welcome to the FTC UMC Roundup for June 3, 2023–Memorial Day week. The holiday meant we had a short week, but we still have plenty of news to share. It also means we’re now in meteorological summer, a reminder that the sands of legislative time run quickly through the hourglass. So it’s perhaps unsurprising that ... The FTC UMC Roundup – Welcome to June Edition

Pixtopia Is Not Real 

Banco Central do Brasil (BCB), Brazil’s central bank, launched a new real-time payment (RTP) system in November 2020 called Pix. Evangelists at the central bank hoped that Pix would offer a low-cost alternative to existing payments systems and would entice some of the country’s tens of millions of unbanked and underbanked adults into the banking ... Pixtopia Is Not Real 

The FTC UMC Roundup – May 27 Edition

Welcome to the Truth on the Market FTC UMC Roundup for May 27, 2022. This week we have (Hail Mary?) revisions to Sen. Amy Klobuchar’s (D-Minn.) American Innovation and Choice Online Act, initiatives that can’t decide whether they belong in Congress or the Federal Trade Commission, and yet more commentary on inflation and antitrust, along ... The FTC UMC Roundup – May 27 Edition

Final DMA: Now We Know Where We’re Going, but We Still Don’t Know Why

After years of debate and negotiations, European Lawmakers have agreed upon what will most likely be the final iteration of the Digital Markets Act (“DMA”), following the March 24 final round of “trilogue” talks.  For the uninitiated, the DMA is one in a string of legislative proposals around the globe intended to “rein in” tech ... Final DMA: Now We Know Where We’re Going, but We Still Don’t Know Why

10 Things the American Innovation and Choice Online Act Gets Wrong

The Senate Judiciary Committee is set to debate S. 2992, the American Innovation and Choice Online Act (or AICOA) during a markup session Thursday. If passed into law, the bill would force online platforms to treat rivals’ services as they would their own, while ensuring their platforms interoperate seamlessly. The bill marks the culmination of ... 10 Things the American Innovation and Choice Online Act Gets Wrong

Antitrust Dystopia and Antitrust Nostalgia

The dystopian novel is a powerful literary genre. It has given us such masterpieces as Nineteen Eighty-Four, Brave New World, and Fahrenheit 451. Though these novels often shed light on the risks of contemporary society and the zeitgeist of the era in which they were written, they also almost always systematically overshoot the mark (intentionally ... Antitrust Dystopia and Antitrust Nostalgia

Antitrust Statutorification

A lot of water has gone under the bridge since my book was published last year. To close this symposium, I thought I would discuss the new phase of antirust statutorification taking place before our eyes. In the United States, Congress is working on five antitrust bills that propose to subject platforms to stringent obligations, ... Antitrust Statutorification

ICLE at the Oxford Union

Earlier this year, the International Center for Law & Economics (ICLE) hosted a conference with the Oxford Union on the themes of innovation, competition, and economic growth with some of our favorite scholars. Though attendance at the event itself was reserved for Oxford Union members, videos from that day are now available for everyone to ... ICLE at the Oxford Union

A First Glance at the Biden Executive Order on Competition: The Good and the Bad (Including Much that Looks Ugly)

The Biden Administration’s July 9 Executive Order on Promoting Competition in the American Economy is very much a mixed bag—some positive aspects, but many negative ones. It will have some positive effects on economic welfare, to the extent it succeeds in lifting artificial barriers to competition that harm consumers and workers—such as allowing direct sales ... A First Glance at the Biden Executive Order on Competition: The Good and the Bad (Including Much that Looks Ugly)

The Digital Markets Act Shouldn’t Mandate Radical Interoperability

Despite calls from some NGOs to mandate radical interoperability, the EU’s draft Digital Markets Act (DMA) adopted a more measured approach, requiring full interoperability only in “ancillary” services like identification or payment systems. There remains the possibility, however, that the DMA proposal will be amended to include stronger interoperability mandates, or that such amendments will ... The Digital Markets Act Shouldn’t Mandate Radical Interoperability

The Problem of Data Property Rights

Policy discussions about the use of personal data often have “less is more” as a background assumption; that data is overconsumed relative to some hypothetical optimal baseline. This overriding skepticism has been the backdrop for sweeping new privacy regulations, such as the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) and the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). ... The Problem of Data Property Rights

It’s Not So Simple Who Owns “Your” Data

What kind of regulation? Treating digital platforms like public utilities won’t work, Petit argues, because the product is multidimensional and competition takes place on multiple margins (the larger theme of the book): “there is a plausible chance that increased competition in digital markets will lead to a race to the bottom, in which price competition ... It’s Not So Simple Who Owns “Your” Data