This book provides a comprehensive, authoritative, and state-of-the-art discussion of fundamental legal issues in intermediary liability online, while also describing advancement in intermediary liability theory and identifying recent policy trends.

All forms of online communications and interactions between people and companies on the Internet are facilitated by intermediaries – service providers whose decisions and policies have a shaping effect on the Internet, its users and the information shared on it. Today, because such intermediaries employ technologies that go well beyond the mere transmission and storage of information into new realms potentially disrupting existing business models, a rethinking of existing relevant law is called for. The legal analysis and recommendations in this book put the topic of intermediary liability in the perspective of copyright law and offer a vision on how to regulate that liability. In the context of in-depth and up-to-date analyses on EU, US, German and Dutch law, the author discusses such issues and topics as the following: the liability rules in the new Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market; liability for the intermediary’s own copyright infringements (primary liability); the intermediary’s responsibility to stop or prevent the infringements of others (secondary liability); the role that fundamental rights play in copyright law and intermediary liability; the rights and interests of copyright owners, intermediaries and users, and how they are protected; notice-and-takedown by service providers; website blocking by Internet access providers; the publisher’s rights and the use of online articles by platforms; legal status of hyperlinks under copyright law; and search engine use of copyrighted materials. A focus on the strengths and weaknesses of existing EU copyright law concerning Internet intermediaries in terms of how future-proof that law is, includes detailed attention to legislation, regulation and case law. With its deeply informed guidance with respect to the methods of regulation in a domain that is heavily influenced by technological developments, this book will be welcomed by policymakers, legislators, academics, judges and practitioners working in the area of copyright law as applied to the Internet. The detailed attention to the extent to which an intermediary can be held liable for copyright infringements in both the EU and the US will prove highly beneficial for in-house counsellors and advisors working for rights holder organizations and intermediary service providers.

Fundamental Rights Protection Online presents an in-depth analysis of national, supranational and international attempts at online speech regulation, illustrating how the law has been unsettled on how to treat intermediaries.

Scholars puzzle over the conditions that make rule of law development in authoritarian settings successful. In this significant contribution, focusing on the decade of Myanmar's political transformation, Kristina Simion explores rule of law assistance through the practice and experience of intermediaries, their capital, strategies and challenges. How do intermediaries influence the field, and the ways in which the rule of law is brokered transnationally? And why do they matter? Simion relates her research to law and sociology to bring to light these neglected players, focusing on who they are, the influence they have, their double agency and their crucial importance in establishing trust and translating rule of law. Relying on rich empirical data collected in Myanmar, the book shares the voices of the individuals that help to steer societal change within authoritarian confines. This socio-legal work offers some insights into why rule of law change in authoritarian settings often does not go expected ways, one of the development field's long unresolved issues.

This open access volume of the AIDA Europe Research Series on Insurance Law and Regulation offers the first comprehensive legal and regulatory analysis of the Insurance Distribution Directive (IDD). The IDD came into force on 1 October 2018 and regulates the distribution of insurance products in the EU. The book examines the main changes accompanying the IDD and analyses its impact on insurance distributors, i.e., insurance intermediaries and insurance undertakings, as well as the market. Drawing on interrelations between the rules of the Directive and other fields that are relevant to the distribution of insurance products, it explores various topics related to the interpretation of the IDD - e.g. the harmonization achieved under it; its role as a benchmark for national legislators; and its interplay with other regulations and sciences - while also providing an empirical analysis of the standardised pre-contractual information document. Accordingly, the book offers a wealth of valuable insights for academics, regulators, practitioners and students who are interested in issues concerning insurance distribution.--

This book analyzes the business model of enterprises in the digital economy by taking an economic and comparative perspective. The aim of this book is to conduct an in-depth analysis of the anti-competitive behavior of companies who monopolize data, and put forward the necessity of regulating data monopoly by exploring the causes and characteristics of their anti-competitive behavior. It studies four aspects of the differences between data monopoly and traditional monopolistic behavior, namely defining the relevant market for data monopolies, the entry barrier, the problem of determining the dominant position of data monopoly, and the influence on consumer welfare. It points out the limitations of traditional regulatory tools and discusses how new regulatory methods could be developed within the competition legal framework to restrict data monopolies. It proposes how economic analytical tools used in traditional anti-monopoly law are facing challenges and how competition enforcement agencies could adjust regulatory methods to deal with new anti-competitive behavior by data monopolies.

This book presents a comprehensive view of Internet intermediaries, their economic and social function, development and prospects, benefits and costs, and roles and responsibilities.