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The digital transformation is making the EU institutions and administration more vulnerable to cyber-threats and incidents. Their number has surged dramatically in recent years: there were as many incidents during the first half of 2021 as in the whole of 2020, for instance. Yet an analysis of 20 Union institutions, bodies and agencies showed that their governance, preparedness, cybersecurity capability and maturity vary substantially, weakening the system. This proposal for a regulation would establish ...

The crypto-asset sector, while still relatively new, has already changed the world of payments and investment forever. The fast-changing, mobile nature of the sector and its growing market prominence poses challenges, however, for tax authorities, which are not always able to track the capital gains made from trading crypto-assets. On 8 December 2022, the European Commission proposed to set up a reporting framework which would require crypto-asset service providers to report transactions made by ...

On 23 February 2022, the European Commission unveiled a proposal for an EU regulation – the data act – laying down harmonised rules on fair access to and use of data. The aim is to remove barriers to consumers and businesses' access to data, in a context in which the volume of data generated by humans and machines is increasing exponentially and becoming a critical factor for innovation by businesses (e.g. algorithm training) and by public authorities (e.g. shaping of smart cities). The proposed ...

The 2014 Regulation on electronic identification and trust services for electronic transactions in the internal market (eIDAS Regulation or eIDAS) was the first digital identity legislation to provide the basis for cross-border electronic identification, authentication and website certification throughout the EU. Application of eIDAS has been mixed. However, the pandemic increased the need for such solutions to be put in place to access public and private services. On 3 June 2021, the Commission ...

As digital technologies have been increasingly permeating our lives, artificial intelligence (AI) has gradually made it onto the scene too, but without much fanfare. This once daunting prospect has become a part of our lives even in domains that do not seem to belong to a futurist world, such as cultural heritage and museums. The results are both promising and surprising: reconstructing a piece of art, completing an unfinished composition of a great musician, identifying the author of an ancient ...

In December 2019, Directive (EU) 2019/1937 on the protection of persons who report breaches of Union law (hereafter 'the directive') entered into force. Member States had 2 years to transpose the directive into their domestic legal systems. Prior to the entry into force of the directive, the legal framework was fragmented at national level and limited in scope to specific sectors at EU level (i.e. financial services and transport safety). Transposition did not prove easy, and the European Commission ...

The second Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (MiFID II) and the Markets in Financial Instruments Regulation (MiFIR) are the principal texts regulating investment services and financial markets activities in the EU. Following an extensive consultation and in light of the recent developments in the context of the coronavirus pandemic, the European Commission proposed the establishment of an EU-wide consolidated tape for financial markets instruments, as well as making targeted changes to market ...

Two European Union (EU) directives regulate the EU collective investment funds industry, the Directive relating to undertakings for collective investment in transferable securities (UCITS) and the Alternative Investment Funds Manager Directive (AIFMD). The UCITS, which covers mutual funds, lays down uniform rules, allowing them to be offered cross-border, while the AIFMD, which covers hedge funds and private equity, lays down the rules for authorising, supervising and overseeing the managers of such ...

Directive 2019/1151/EU on the use of digital tools and processes in company law was the first step towards digitalisation in the area of company law. The directive amended EU company law provisions to enable online formation, registration of branches and filing of documents for limited liability companies. Its purpose was to facilitate such processes and make them cost-effective for businesses, including for cross-border activities. The digitalisation of company law is one aspect of EU digital policy ...

In November 2022, the European Commission published a proposal for a regulation laying down measures for a high level of public sector interoperability across the Union (the interoperable Europe act). The initiative seeks to ensure a consistent, human-centric EU approach to interoperability, create an interoperability governance structure that helps public administrations and the private sector to work together, and establish an ecosystem of interoperability solutions for the EU's public sector. ...