Law for Computer Scientists and Other Folk

Description

This is a textbook on law for computer scientists and many others with no wish to become a lawyer, who are nevertheless in need of a proper introduction to how law operates and how it affects individuals, societies, and others. It introduces: privacy and data protection, cybercrime, copyright, private law liability and legal personhood.

• The only dedicated textbook introducing law to computer scientists and other relevant audiences (non lawyers)
• Dedicated focus on cybercrime, intellectual property, data protection, private law liability and legal personhood
• The book will provide insight into the operations of the law, demonstrating the specifics of legal reasoning
• Clear structure with a reader's guide, a handy glossary/index, and frequent cross-referencing throughout the book
• This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International licence

About the Author(s)

Mireille Hildebrandt, Research Professor 'Interfacing Law and Technology', Free University Brussels

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements
Reading Guide
Abbreviations
Table of Contents
1:Introduction: Textbook and Essay
1.1:Middle ground: architecture
1.2:Law in 'speakerspace'
1.3:Law in 'manuscriptspace'
1.4:Law in 'bookspace'
1.5:Law in cyberspace: a new 'onlife world'
1.6:Outline
PART I WHAT LAW DOES
2.:Law, Democracy, and the Rule of Law
2.1:What is Law?
2.2:What is law in a constitutional democracy?
3.:Domains of Law: Private, Public, and Criminal Law
3.1:Private, public and criminal law: conceptual distinctions
3.2:Private law
3.3:Public law and criminal law
4.:International and Supranational Law
4.1:Jurisdiction in Western legal systems
4.2:International law
4.3:Supranational law
4.4:International rule of law
PART II DOMAINS OF CYBERLAW
5.:Privacy and Data Protection
5.1:Human rights law
5.2:The concept of privacy
5.3:The right to privacy
5.4:Privacy and Data Protection
5.5:Data protection law
5.6:Privacy and data protection revisited
6.:Cybercrime
6.1:The problem of cybercrime
6.2:Cybercrime and public law
6.3:The EU cybercrime and cybersecurity directives
7.:Copyright in Cyberspace
7.1:IP law as private law
7.2:Overview of IP rights
7.3:History, objectives and scope of copyright protection
7.4:EU copyright law
7.5:Open source and free access
8.:Private Law Liability for Faulty ICT
8.1:Back to basics
8.2:Tort law in Europe
8.3:Third-party liability for unlawful processing and other cyber torts
PART III FRONTIERS OF LAW IN AN ONLIFE WORLD
9.:Legal Personhood for AI?
9.1:Legal subjectivity
9.2:Legal agency
9.3:Artificial agents
9.4:Private law liability
10.:'Legal by Design' or 'Legal Protection by Design'?
10.1:Machine learning (ML)
10.2:Distributed Ledger Technologies (DLTs), smart contracts and smart regulation
10.3:'Legal by Design' or 'Legal Protection by Design'?
FINALS
11.:Closure: on ethics, code and law
11.1:Distinctions between law, code and ethics
11.2:The conceptual relationship between law, code and ethics
11.3:The interaction between law, code and ethics
11.4:Closure: the force of technology and the force of law

Reviews

"It provides an overview of the practical implications of law, their theoretical underpinnings and how they affect the study and construction of computational architectures." - H. W. Micklitz, Journal of Consumer Policy