It’s spring, so that means it’s time to ditch passwords in favour of selfie IDs (say some banks), it’s time to contemplate life continuing in the EU, and outside if a Brexit comes to pass. Meanwhile some car manufacturers have woken up to the hackability of their systems, and Apple’s dispute with the FBI continues to hot up… just another typical month for technology lawyers.
But look at the range of issues, consider the varying interests and contemplate the jurisdictions involved… was there ever a better time to decide to develop a wider, more international view of IT Law? Good job that IFCLA is just around the corner then! The {IFCLA Conference: http://ifcla2016.com/} will essentially be the SCL annual conference, but on steroids! As you know, this is organised by the SCL team and hosted by SCL in London. It’s starting to look like the best event SCL has organised to date. The speaker line-up is getting stronger by the day and now includes international speakers from private practice and in-house; all leaders in their fields, covering the key issues that concern us all today. This will be an unmissable chance for debate at such an important time for the UK with the impending EU referendum etc. Look, for example, at the speakers billed to discuss IT Transformation, Fintech or cyber security issues. These colleagues are living the issues some of us merely follow in the press and so you should really make every effort to grab this opportunity, attend the conference and gain practical insights that you can use in your professional life going forward.
Don’t forget it’s not all about the law, the people side is equally important, and so we have created opportunities to network with your peers; including a drinks reception on Wednesday evening, 10 floors up on a balcony overlooking London. See here for latest programme and speakers.
What else can I tell you this month? Well, as I mentioned in my opening message, we are also looking at certain events where we will really dive deeply into complex issues. One such is the {SCL Better Contracts Initiative: http://www.scl.org/site.aspx?i=ev46589}. This has clearly hit the right note with you all, we have 60+ attendees registered to come already and it promises to be the start of a healthy debate which could change the way we construct, negotiate and conclude IT contracts in the future. Miss that at your peril!
Probably like many of you, I commute to work, and during that time I flick through twitter for a speedread of the latest news and comment. If you have not done so already, I recommend including the {SCL Twitter feed: https://twitter.com/computersandlaw} as one of your news sources. As the Privacy Shield emerged last month, and we started to consider what the US might be required to do to be clear about its use of data, I spotted that SCL had re-tweeted a statement from Penny Pritzker. I looked closer and realised that she is the US Secretary of Commerce, and, following the link, found myself watching a short clip from her, explaining the US viewpoint. Super-quick information for the time-poor and straight from the original source – just what I needed.
