News & Insights - Digital Economy

Matheson Digital Economy Group’s annual conference took place in Dublin today, entitled “Regulating Tech, AI and Cybersecurity: A 360° Perspective”.

On 10 September 2024, the Central Bank of Ireland (“Central Bank”) published a frequently asked questions (“FAQ”) page in relation to Crypto Asset Service Provider (“CASP”) applications under the Regulation (EU) 2023/1114 Markets in Crypto Assets Regulation (“MICA”).

EU Regulation 2024/1083, the European Media Freedom Act (“EMFA”) was enacted in May 2024 and is to be incorporated into Irish primary legislation. This should happen before 8 August 2025, when most of EMFA becomes effective as a matter of EU law. This article focuses on the positive potential of EMFA to make doing business in Ireland easier, by putting an end to technical Irish media merger filings for ‘foreign-to-foreign media mergers’ and ‘non-media JVs’. We also consider the potential of EMFA to impose new filing requirements on acquisitions of social media platforms.

The Court of Justice of the European Union (“CJEU”) in joined cases C‑182/22 and C‑189/22, Scalable Capital, has provided some further clarification regarding compensation for non-material damage under Article 82(1) of the GDPR as a result of the theft by third parties of personal data. The decision reflects a high threshold for claiming non-material damages in respect of “identity theft”.

The Data Protection Commission ("DPC") recently published its Annual Report for 2023. The Report sets out the breadth of work undertaken by the DPC over the past year.

Major new legal requirements will place specific cybersecurity obligations on companies across Ireland’s economy by the end of this year.

On 5 December 2023, in cases C-683/21 and C-807/21, the Court of Justice of the European Union ("CJEU") rejected the application of strict liability for administrative fines under the GDPR. The CJEU confirmed that organisations can only be subject to administrative fines for breaches of the GDPR, if it can be shown that their infringement was committed intentionally or negligently.

Brought to you by Matheson's Digital Economy Group ("DEG"), this latest edition focuses on trends in relation to data breach notifications as well as highlighting the key enforcement themes coming out of Data Protection Commission ("DPC") regulatory inquiries.

The Matheson team has extensive experience in assisting businesses with their cyber-security defence, both in terms of containing and combatting a breach but also in minimising the damage to the business following a cyber attack.

In 2021 cyber threats have been trending to increased ransomware attacks, commodity malware and heightened Dark Web enablement. INTERPOL reported that the projected worldwide financial loss to cyber crime for 2021 is $6 trillion.