In March 2026 the darts phenomenon and reigning World Champion, Luke Littler, applied to the UK Intellectual Property Office (IPO) to register his face as a trade mark in the UK across a variety of different categories [From the Oche to the IPO: can a face function as a trade mark? | Global IP & … Continue Reading
On 17 June 2026, the Department for Transport and the UK government’s Centre for Connected and Autonomous Vehicles opened a new consultation inviting views from any interested parties on its draft statement of safety principles for automated vehicles [Automated vehicles: statement of safety principles consultation – GOV.UK]. The statement is a requirement under section 2 … Continue Reading
As trailed in the media over this weekend, the UK prime minister Sir Kier Starmer has today announced that the UK government intends to introduce a full ban on under-16s from accessing social media platforms Social media to be banned for under-16s in landmark government move to give kids their childhood back – GOV.UK. Scope of … Continue Reading
In October 2025, UK regulator, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), published its final decision to designate Google as having strategic market status (SMS) in the UK in general search and search advertising services. This designation covered Google’s substantial and entrenched market power in general search and search advertising, and whilst Google’s Gemini AI tool … Continue Reading
The authors wish to thank Jonathan Mason for his contributions to this post. In early March, the darts phenomenon and reigning World Champion, Luke Littler, applied to the UK Intellectual Property Office (“IPO”) to register his face as a trade mark in the UK across a variety of different categories from the obvious (class 9 … Continue Reading
As with all industries, agentic AI is already starting to have a dramatic impact on the automotive industry, particularly with regard to:… Continue Reading
As trailed in its progress statement published in December 2025 and discussed in our previous blog, the UK government published on 18 March 2026 its much awaited full report considering the use of copyright works in the development of AI systems. The report follows the government’s high-profile consultation on Copyright and Artificial Intelligence which ran … Continue Reading
On 4 November 2025 the UK High Court handed down its judgment in the case of Getty Images (US) Inc (and others) v Stability AI Limited [2025] EWHC 2863 (Ch) [High Court Judgment Template]. The case concerned the training, development and deployment of Stability AI’s “Stable Diffusion” generative AI model and, as one of the … Continue Reading
As part of a package of measures detailed in its Small Business Plan released today the UK government has announced plans to tackle late payments to small and medium sized businesses (SMEs) in the UK with the most significant legislative reforms in over 25 years aimed at introducing the toughest laws on late payment in … Continue Reading
In November 2024 the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) announced a project to consider how and when dynamic pricing is being used across different sectors of the UK economy and how that may affect consumers and the wider economy/competition in the UK market [Dynamic pricing project – GOV.UK]. This project is not an enforcement investigation and … Continue Reading
As many will know, the Autonomous Vehicle Act 2024 (the “AV Act”) paved the way to legalising the use of autonomous vehicles on UK roads. However, before any autonomous vehicles can be used on the UK roads (other than under controlled trials), it is important to be aware that the AV Act does not, at … Continue Reading
The Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024 (DMCCA) [Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024] has both increased consumer protection rights in the UK and the enforcement powers of the main consumer regulator, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) which for the first time has been granted wide-ranging powers to investigate suspected breaches of … Continue Reading
The authors wish to thank Royce Clemente for his contribution to this post. The UK Government has delayed the implementation of the Advertising (Less Healthy Food Definitions and Exemptions) Regulations 2024 (“Regulations”), which were due to come into force on 1 October 2025, in order to explicitly exempt ‘pure brand’ advertising from the Regulations. The Regulations … Continue Reading
2023 has been the year that governments, regulators and international organisations have all sought to get to grips with the challenges of regulating AI including the publication in April of the UK government’s policy paper outlining its proposed approach to AI regulation; the EU’s AI Act which may shortly become the world’s first piece of … Continue Reading
The often-controversial UK Online Safety Act (the OSA) has finally become law after receiving Royal Assent yesterday, heralding the end of the era of largely self-regulation for user generated content by technology platforms, whether large or small. The OSA will impose new duties on all providers who host “user generated content” (i.e. services which allow … Continue Reading
The UK government announced on 2 August 2023 a new consultation for proposed changes to the UK’s product safety laws. Whilst much of this consultation is concerned with the regulatory compliance arrangements for the testing and marking of products what has received less immediate media coverage are proposals also included to impose additional duties on … Continue Reading
There has been considerable media coverage in the UK this week following the government’s announcement that it is to reduce the scope of its controversial Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill (Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Bill publications – Parliamentary Bills – UK Parliament). Had this bill entered into law in its original … Continue Reading
The UK’s IPEC court has granted various movie studios and Nintendo website blocking injunctions to prevent the infringement of their IP rights. The legal victories demonstrate the practical measures the English legal system is willing to take in the fight against online piracy.… Continue Reading
As we reported earlier this year, following a six-month adjustment period, a new rule dealing with the depiction of harmful gender stereotypes, has been introduced into the CAP and BCAP Codes, which came into force on 14 June 2019. Despite being just a month in, the ASA has already received complaints about adverts which appear … Continue Reading
Anyone who negotiates contracts for a living has their own personal war stories of dealing with other parties whose significant negotiating leverage meant they ended up accepting terms which in an ideal world they wouldn’t. But could having the upper hand and using that to extract the best possible deal come back to haunt you? … Continue Reading
In a landmark decision, the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) in the UK recently ruled that, for the purposes of the CAP Code at least, a social media user may be considered a celebrity where they have 30,000 followers or more. In this case, the ASA found that an influencer breached the CAP Code when she … Continue Reading
With childhood obesity rates in the UK among some of the worst in Europe, the Government has set a national target to halve childhood obesity by 2030. Whilst the Government acknowledges that this is a multi-faceted problem, it has reported that evidence suggests that children’s exposure to advertising of products that are high in fat, … Continue Reading
The Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market (the Directive), has now been published in the Official Journal, and entered into force on Friday 7 June 2019. EU member states have two years in which to transpose the Directive (which is now officially Directive (EU) 2019/790 on copyright and related rights in the Digital … Continue Reading
The recent judgment in ATB Sales Limited v Rich Energy Limited [2019] EWHC 1207 (IPEC) illustrates the difficulties parties will have in defending copyright infringement claims over artistic works, if they can only provide limited documentary proof of the creative design process. Background ATB Sales Limited (“Claimant”) brought the action against three Defendants: Rich Energy … Continue Reading
