Europes

“EDPS Alerts: Europe’s Privacy Principles Threatened by Rapid AI Advancements”

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The European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS) has warned key planks of the bloc’s data protection and privacy regime are under attack from industry lobbyists and could face a critical reception from lawmakers in the next parliamentary mandate. Any shift of approach by incoming lawmakers could have implications for the bloc’s high standard of protection for people’s data. But he particularly highlighted industry lobbying, especially complaints from businesses targeting the GDPR principle of purpose limitation. Wiewiórowski did not explicitly blame generative AI for driving the “strong attacks” on the GDPR’s purpose limitation principle. So any AI-driven weakening of EU data protection laws in the near term is likely to have long term consequences for citizens’ human rights.

British Government Contributes $44 Million Towards Europe’s $1.4 Billion Investment in Semiconductor Industry

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The UK has exited the European Union, but semiconductor development is emerging as one of the areas where it hopes to partner for better economies of scale — and much-needed funding. The UK itself said it would put up a more modest £35 million ($44 million) in funding for UK efforts over the next few years as part of that. The Chips Joint Undertaking, for example, has an overall budget of about €11 billion from both public and private contributions. In December 2023, Pragmatic Semiconductor, another Cambridge-based chip company, raised $231 million at a $500 million valuation. “We are very happy to welcome the UK to the Chips Joint Undertaking as a participating state,” said Jari Kinaret, Chips JU Executive Director, in a statement.

Europe’s Tech Investment Slump: A Report of Renewed Hope

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New report confirms Europe’s tech investment doldrums, but there are signs of lifeEurope is suffering from a big hangover after the tech investment party of the 2020-2021 period. That said, compared to pre-pandemic levels, VC investment in European startups is up, historically speaking, and reached $60 billion, according to a new report. 2023 marked a reset and major correction in investment levels globally. According to the report, Europe is sitting on “record levels of dry powder” and “producing more new founders than the U.S.”, funding remains slow. Climate Tech overtook FinTech as Europe’s most popular sectorAI’s share of total investment in Europe soared to a record high of 17%5.

TikTok Introduces Groundbreaking API for Data Portability, Prior to Europe’s DMA Compliance Deadline

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TikTok is introducing a data portability API to help it comply with new European regulations designed to rein in Big Tech’s market dominance through various obligations and restrictions. Data transfersData portability and interoperability constitutes a major part of the DMA regulations, and tech companies have been bolstering their efforts on this front for several years in preparation. Thus the data portability API goes some way toward addressing that limitation, allowing third-party developers to build conduits for data to travel from TikTok to their own apps — if the user authorizes this. Through the API, developers can request access to “all available data,” or individual categories including TikTok posts and profile data, activity, and direct messages (DMs). The data portability API is available to applicants globally, but the developer must be able to demonstrate a “well-defined use case” before they will be approved.