Lawyer news

• UK introduces law to ban civilian encryption, but government policies ... - ExtremeTech

  04-11-2015 21:11
  ExtremeTech
  UK introduces law to ban civilian encryption, but government policies ...
  ExtremeTech
  Last January, in the wake of the terrorist attacks in Paris, UK Prime Minister David Cameron began advocating for limiting or preventing ordinary citizens from using end-to-end encryption that the government could not break. Now, the government has ...en meer »
  

• Rising student debts pose threat to diversity of judiciary, says top judge

  04-11-2015 19:28
  
  Lady Justice Hallett calls for positive discrimination in awarding training grants to students from less privileged backgroundsOppressive levels of student debts risk reversing gains made in improving diversity among the judiciary, one of the UK’s most senior female judges has said.Lady Justice Hallett, who sits on the court of appeal, has called for positive discrimination in awarding barristers’ training grants to students from less privileged social backgrounds. Continue reading..
  
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• Labour to set up legal aid commission

  04-11-2015 18:37 via lawgazette.co.uk
  
  Opposition party to review government reforms and publish report in time for next year’s conference.
  
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• Web snooping plans lack protection for lawyers

  04-11-2015 18:34 via lawgazette.co.uk
  
  Law Society calls for government to recognise legal privilege as a fundamental right.
  
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• UK spying law could put ordinary people's personal data at risk - New Scientist

  04-11-2015 17:58
  New Scientist
  UK spying law could put ordinary people's personal data at risk
  New Scientist
  The UK government wants to know more about you. A bill proposed to Parliament today demands that internet service providers (ISPs) keep a record of every website its customers have visited in the last 12 months. It also creates a legal basis for the ...en meer »
  

• John Roberts's anti-immigrant hypothetical was just legal wordplay | Scott Lemieux

  04-11-2015 17:08
  
  The US supreme court chief justice may not really think the unemployed should sue the undocumented – he thinks fewer folks should get their day in courtThere was a curious moment during Tuesday’s oral argument at the US supreme court. The justices were considering Spokeo, Inc v Robins, a case about whether a man named Thomas Robins could sue a company that put erroneous information online in violation of the federal Fair Credit Reporting Act.At one point, Chief Justice John Roberts p
  
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• These internet surveillance powers risk undermining the judiciary | Joshua Rozenberg

  04-11-2015 17:04
  
  Theresa May has revealed her revived plan to mass monitor web browsing history. But how will it work practically? The devil is in the detailUnder surveillance plans set out by the home secretary, Theresa May, a new high-profile investigatory powers (IP) commissioner will be at the heart of the government’s planned reforms. They will head a team of about seven judicial commissioners, all of whom will have to have served as high court or appeal judges. Their most important job will be to app
  
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• U.K. Users' Online Activity To Be Logged Under New Surveillance Law - TechCrunch

  04-11-2015 16:28
  TechCrunch
  U.K. Users' Online Activity To Be Logged Under New Surveillance Law
  TechCrunch
  The U.K. government has today published a draft bill setting out new surveillance powers that if passed into law will allow the security and intelligence agencies to more deeply probe Brits' digital activity by requiring U.K. ISPs keep a log of all the ...
  UK cyber-spy law takes Snowden's revelations of mass surveillance – and sets ...The Register
  UK surveillance bill makes a scientific ass out of th
  

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• The Pistorius appeal has helped restore South Africa's faith in the law

  04-11-2015 14:41
  
  As the court considers whether culpable homicide should be upgraded to murder, the fundamentals of the country’s constitution are being reaffirmed, argues Mandy WienerNearly three years since that fateful Valentine’s night when Oscar Pistorius shot dead his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp, it feels like the case has permeated South African society so completely that it’s become impossible to escape. Just when we think we can move on, it bubbles back to the surface. Now, our headlin
  
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• CPS breached Data Protection Act for 12 years, ICO reveals

  04-11-2015 14:04 via lawgazette.co.uk
  
  Crown Prosecution Service fined £200,000 after two unencrypted laptops containing recorded police interviews were stolen last year.
  
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• Supreme Court dismisses £85 parking ticket challenge

  04-11-2015 13:51 via lawgazette.co.uk
  
  Fine imposed for overstaying a two-hour parking limit was not an unlawful penalty, judges rule in Beavis v ParkingEye.
  
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• Corbyn condemns Cameron's decision to welcome Egyptian president to No 10

  04-11-2015 13:51
  
  Labour leader condemns Abdel Fatah al-Sisi’s visit as the guest of PM and calls for UK to suspend arms exports to CairoThe Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn, has condemned David Cameron’s decision to welcome the Egyptian president to Downing Street and called for the UK to suspend arms exports to the country.Corbyn said Abdel Fatah al-Sisi’s visit to No 10 on Thursday as the guest of Cameron showed “contempt for human and democratic rights”. Continue reading...
  
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• ‘Modern’ Scots eye non-solicitor members

  04-11-2015 12:45 via lawgazette.co.uk
  
  Law Society of Scotland also seeking to forge ahead with ABSs – five years after Holyrood first legislated.
  
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• LAA committed to 11 January start for new legal aid contracts

  04-11-2015 12:38 via lawgazette.co.uk
  
  Legal Aid Agency says it will strongly defend any litigation from unsuccessful bidders.
  
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• Gove hints at scrapping criminal courts charge

  04-11-2015 12:32 via lawgazette.co.uk
  
  The lord chancellor admits the charge is a ‘cause for concern’. 
  
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• CPS fined over theft of laptops holding interviews with sex attack victims

  04-11-2015 12:30
  
  Information Commissioner’s Office fines CPS £200,000 after finding that videos had not been kept securely by private film studioThe Crown Prosecution Service has been fined £200,000 after laptops containing videos of police interviews with victims of sex attacks were stolen from a private film studio.The highly unusual security breach and heavy penalty follow an inquiry by the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), which is responsible for enforcing data protection laws
  
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• The In-House Lawyer Survey 2015: Balancing Acts - Legal Business (blog)

  04-11-2015 11:17
  Legal Business (blog)
  The In-House Lawyer Survey 2015: Balancing Acts
  Legal Business (blog)
  LegalBusinessUK RT @carlgardner: I read somewhere years ago that the world's run by shapeshifting lizards. It wasn't correct. https://t.co/5SlfX3jNr5 · 33m • reply • retweet • favorite · LegalBusinessUK 'Maly departs @lathamwatkins to join former ...en meer »
  

• Judge gives 'opportunistic' litigants costs warning

  04-11-2015 10:29 via lawgazette.co.uk
  
  Mr Justice Fraser said both parties ‘determined to fight bitterly over every possible inch of ground’
  
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• Press regulation: recognition panel celebrates its first birthday

  04-11-2015 10:06
  
  It reminds publishers that they are not protected from exemplary damages In case you overlooked it, Tuesday marked the first birthday of the Press Recognition Panel (PRP), the body created under royal charter to oversee press regulation. Its task is to “recognise” and approve press regulators that meet the charter’s 29 criteria. Foremost among them is that a regulator should be independent of the publishers it regulates. Continue reading...
  
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• Apple should stop selling iPhones in the UK if 'stupid' new law goes ahead ... - The Independent

  04-11-2015 09:53
  The Independent
  Apple should stop selling iPhones in the UK if 'stupid' new law goes ahead ...
  The Independent
  Apple should stop selling its popular iPhone line in the UK if a new law banning fully encrypted communications is passed, the founder of Wikipedia has said. Jimmy Wales, who set up the online encyclopaedia in 2001, described the draft Investigatory ...
  New U.K. law might force Apple to decrypt the iPhone for police investigationsBGR
  Approval Of Surveillance Law In UK Could Cause Apple
  

• Fifty years on, the debate over what replaces the death penalty continues

  04-11-2015 09:29
  
  The campaign to rid the UK of capital punishment didn’t end in 1965 – questions of penal reform remainThe consignment in 1965 of the hangman’s noose to the penal history museum was, by any standards, a monumental event. It was engineered by the National Campaign for the Abolition of Capital Punishment. A clutch of ardent reformers influenced and persuaded parliamentarians to vote for the abolition of the death penalty for murder, during just one year’s legislative program
  
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• Celebrating the hidden history of disabled people’s fight for civil rights | Frances Ryan

  04-11-2015 08:30
  
  Exhibition in Manchester marks 20 years of the Disability Discrimination Act and pays tribute to the activists who helped bring it about“If you compare it to other groups, like the suffragettes or trade unionists, how disabled people gained their civil rights has really been a hidden history,” says Chris Burgess, curator of exhibitions and collections at the People’s History Museum in Manchester.But that’s all about to change. The disability charity Scope has collabo
  
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• 'Call me when he tries to kill you': Kyrgyzstan ignoring domestic violence

  04-11-2015 08:00
  
  Research highlights how police and courts protect perpetrators while exposing millions of women and girls to abuse. EurasiaNet.org reports After being severely beaten by her partner, Asya phoned the Kyrgyzstan police for help. “They said, ‘Did he use a knife? Did he try to kill you?’ I would say, ‘No,’ and they would say, ‘OK, you call me when he tries to kill you, because we have more important things to do,” she said, recalling two incidents in 2012.As
  
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• San Francisco voters appear to reject anti-Airbnb legislation

  04-11-2015 07:00
  
  Voters rejected a proposal to restrict short-term rentals following $8m campaign by the online letting company, with 55% of citizens voting againstSan Francisco’s citizens have narrowly voted against controversial proposals to restrict short-term home and apartment rentals, handing a victory to companies such as Airbnb.The failure of “Proposition F” is a victory for the company which has been targeted by affordable housing advocates and tenants’ rights attorneys, though i
  
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