Legal News

The conclusive edition of the General- Purpose AI ( GPAI) Code of Practice appeared on 10 July 2025. It succeeds three prior drafts, issued in November 2024, December 2024, and March 2025. Pending scrutiny and validation by the European Commission and Member States, the 10 July text is treated as definitive in advance of the GPAI provisions of Regulation ( EU) 2024/1689 (the EU AI Act) taking effect on 2 August 2025. Commission guidance clarifying key notions linked to GPAI models, released on 18 July 2025, sits alongside the Code of Practice as an accompaniment. This Code is a voluntary instrument, supported by the EU AI Office and produced by a consortium of academics and industry participants, intended to assist GPAI model providers in fulfilling the corresponding obligations of the EU AI Act (see: LNB News 18/07/2025 40, LNB News...

On 18 July 2025, the Commission issued administrative guidance on the EU AI Act’s rules for GPAI models, designed to clarify scope, core concepts and how these interact with a related code of practice. The guidance sets out key legal terms to map the reach of the EU AI Act’s global partnership and artificial intelligence ( GPAI) regime and pinpoint which businesses must comply. An initial draft was released in April 2025 to gather views from stakeholders. Following that consultation, the Commission’s AI Office outlined the principal revisions to EU Member States at a European AI Board meeting in late June 2025. The GPAI provisions will apply from 2 August 2025... Definition of GPAI models The guidance introduces a quantitative test to determine whether a model qualifies as a GPAI model—and is therefore within the AI Act’s remit—based on the computing power used for...

Under new guidance from the Commission pursuant to the EU DSA, online service providers must implement age-assurance measures that are proportionate to the level of risk their services present to minors. In parallel with the guidance, the Commission has introduced a prototype age-verification app that confirms whether a user is over 18 before accessing adult content, without exposing personal information such as precise age or identity. The recommendations centre on four areas: addictive design cyberbullying harmful content unwanted contact from strangers Although not exhaustive, a Commission official indicated they set a demanding bar for compliance. The official emphasised these are practical recommendations for all platforms, not just Very Large Online Platforms ( VLOPs), intended to steer providers of every size in addressing the harms and risks their services may pose to minors. See: LNB News 25/06/2025 2, LNB News...

Statement follows. CCPC issues warning to motor industry following reports of anticompetitive practices. 7 July 2025 The Competition and Consumer Protection Commission ( CCPC) has cautioned the Irish motor industry following reports of anticompetitive conduct in the sale, servicing and repair of motor vehicles. Through an industry-wide letter to the sector across the country, the CCPC reminded businesses that, under competition law, consumers must not be restricted in choosing who services or repairs their vehicle, or which parts they select. This warning comes after reports from motorists who were stopped or discouraged from having their vehicles serviced or repaired by independent garages......

The EPO announced that its accord with the Intellectual Property Office of Ireland seeks to assist Irish companies, academics and inventors by providing access to premium patent searches with an 80% cut to fees......

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Amazon has contested the rule, which covers orders below €35, petitioning the EU’s top court in April 2025 to overturn it and to have the measure annulled in its entirety. According to the opinion, a national measure designed to foster cultural diversity falls within the EU Services Directive and can be justified only if the classic Article 16 criteria—most notably proportionality—are satisfied and properly evidenced. In short, pursuing cultural diversity does not, by itself, remove a law from the Directive’s scope or exclude it from review. Although, at a Court of Justice of the EU hearing in Luxembourg in April 2025, the French government maintained that the charge is permitted under EU rules that allow limits to defend cultural diversity, the opinion nevertheless insists the measure must still clear the Services Directive’s proportionality and necessity hurdles in a convincing manner. Put...

Statement follows. Inquiry into City of Dublin Education and Training Board ( CDETB) The DPC has today issued its final decision ( Decision), following an investigation into a personal data breach at the CDETB. Acting of its own volition on an own-volition basis, the DPC opened the inquiry in July 2019. It concerned a breach notified by CDETB in November 2018, after the organisation discovered that its webserver had been retaining the personal data of student grant applicants who uploaded information in support of their grant applications via CDETB’s website, as well as the discovery of malware on the webserver. The data processed covered approximately 13,000 data subjects, identifiable by email address, who had submitted supplementary forms through the CDETB website during the years 2017 and 2018. Personal data at risk as a result of the security incident included data subject identity details (name,...

Irish telecom operator Eircom’s damages lawsuit against BT Group over a public-sector contract must be carefully managed to trial to deal with confidentiality issues and other matters, a UK judge told the parties today. At the High Court in London today, a judge said Eircom’s damages action against BT over a public-sector contract needs tight case management through to trial to address confidentiality and related concerns. Eircom brought the claim after Ofcom in 2020 penalised BT for its behaviour during a tender. Speaking to both sides, Judge Adam Johnson urged them to resolve any confidentiality flashpoints themselves and signalled he had no wish to step in unless it became unavoidable. He also expressed confidence that parties would do everything possible to keep confidential designations to a minimum, noting this was necessary to maintain control over the conduct of the trial. He framed this as the...

Tik Tok's obligation to suspend transferring data to China from Europe following an order from Ireland's privacy watchdog has been suspended by an Irish court today. An Irish judge stated the pause will continue until early October, when Tik Tok is scheduled to attend a hearing on its challenge to the Data Protection Commission’s ruling that the platform breached EU data protection rules and incurred a €530m penalty in total......

From August 2025, Ireland will implement the European Media Freedom Act ( EMFA) ( EU Regulation 2024/1083), marking a notable shift in the way media mergers are evaluated across the State... What does the EMFA do? The EMFA’s central objective is to bolster editorial independence and support cross-border trade. It also requires Member States to maintain a national framework to review transactions that could have a ‘significant impact on media pluralism and editorial independence’ ( Article 22)... What is the current position with media mergers in Ireland? Since 2003, Ireland has operated a media merger review system under the Competition Act 2002 (as amended), applying both competition and media plurality tests. At present, media mergers are first notified to the European Commission under the EU Merger Regulation where relevant, or otherwise to the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission ( CCPC) on competition grounds. After clearance from either the...

Senior Magistrate in Chancery Selena E Molina Hours after Meta lodged its final brief on 6 June 2025, Senior Magistrate in Chancery Selena E Molina issued her ruling, ahead of a 17 June trial over document requests by the pension funds, the Northern California Pipe Trades Trust Funds and the Employees’ Retirement System of Rhode Island. In her ruling, Magistrate Molina stated the two funds wish to examine possible breaches of fiduciary duty by the social media company’s directors and senior executives. The magistrate wrote: ‘ This action is stayed until 90 days after both the Irish court and the [ European Union] court have delivered their final determinations on all legal challenges pursued by Meta Ireland relating to the inquiry’. In its filing, Meta characterised the Delaware claim as ‘a textbook......

The proposed measures would apply if EU- US trade negotiations fail. They are intended to sit alongside retaliatory measures agreed on 14 April 2025, which remain on hold until 14 July 2025. This piece sets out why engaging in the current consultation on these EU steps could be crucial if your sector is affected and your commerce with the US is significant. Past practice shows that these rosters are largely determined by stakeholder input and by senior political contacts among Member States and the Commission. Since the EU started developing responses to tariffs on steel and aluminium, imposed under section 232 of the US Trade Expansion Act in March, the Trump administration has layered on further duties. Specifically, in April 2025 the administration levied tariffs under the US International Emergency Economic Powers Act ( IEEPA) on goods originating in the EU, as well as...

SPS Agreement In a noteworthy step for the Irish agri‑food sector, the EU and the UK have committed to progressing a Common Sanitary and Phytosanitary Area by way of what is being termed an ‘ SPS Agreement’. This announcement was made at the inaugural UK‑ EU Summit, which took place on 19 May 2025. The arrangement encompasses a number of areas; however, in this piece we focus on the accord reached regarding sanitary and phytosanitary goods (‘ SPS products’). The intention behind the SPS Agreement is to permit the great majority of animals, animal products, plants and plant products to move across the EU and Great Britain without the requirement for controls. The Windsor Framework would continue to apply in Northern Ireland, enabling it to keep dual access to both the UK’s domestic, internal market and the EU’s single...

Online traders have long been obliged to notify consumers on their websites about the EU's ODR platform. Scrapping that ODR platform is now settled. In parallel, the EU is preparing a sweeping overhaul of the ADR Directive to bolster consumer rights and modernise out-of-court dispute resolution. Businesses should take steps to meet the new requirements. Background Regulation ( EU) No 524/2013, known as the Online Dispute Resolution ( ODR) Regulation, has applied across the EU since 2016. Under this framework, the EU created, maintained and operated the ODR Platform to enable consumers to settle cross-border disputes with online traders swiftly and efficiently, providing out-of-court redress. Every online seller and marketplace targeting consumers ( B2C) has been required to place a conspicuous link to the ODR Platform on its site where offers are aimed at consumers. Yet the platform has seen limited uptake and will...

Byte Dance, Tik Tok’s parent, has appealed a €530m fine levied by Ireland’s privacy regulator, disputing a finding that the social-media platform breached the EU’s data-protection rules by improperly sending user data to China, a company spokesperson said today. The appeal, filed with Ireland’s High Court on 28 May 2025, contests the Irish Data Protection Commission’s ( DPC) decision that Tik Tok failed to implement adequate safeguards to shield European user data from potential access by Chinese authorities, the spokesperson said......

The AI Act follows a staggered timeline for when its different chapters take legal effect, although the enforcement rules and sanction regime will only apply with the bulk of the provisions starting 2 August 2026 The AI Act is being phased in, with different chapters activating at separate times, while the enforcement mechanisms and penalties start alongside most provisions on 2 August 2026. The early roll-out has been demanding, with the Commission juggling the creation of a new AI Office, the publication of administrative guidance, and the orchestration of a code of practice for general-purpose AI models. That code has become especially divisive, touching on delicate matters such as copyright safeguards in developing generative AI and approaches to societal risks, which ultimately led to the legal deadline being missed. It has also turned into a source of friction with the US...

Ireland’s government is set to table a nationwide prohibition on importing goods produced in Palestinian territories under Israeli occupation. Conditions in Gaza are continuing to deteriorate further as Israel curtails deliveries of aid and food. The United Nations has cautioned that this is driving starvation. Simon Harris, Ireland’s Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade, described the step as modest, yet stressed that all countries have a duty to do everything possible to heighten pressure and create the conditions for a ceasefire, because the scale of the humanitarian calamity is scarcely conceivable......

The poorly interconnected islands ENTSO- E’s 2025 Summer Outlook, released today, flags adequacy risks for Ireland, Malta and Cyprus. In practice, this indicates their power systems may fall short of meeting electricity demand due to limited resources or capacity shortfalls. For Ireland specifically, the risk arises from overlapping outages at large dispatchable plants—hydropower, gas and coal—without new dispatchable generation arriving to replace them. To mitigate this, the report notes the Irish sector can turn to non-market resources, such as strategic reserves and capacity mechanisms, to bridge the gap between supply and demand. These findings concern the poorly interconnected islands......

after the Irish privacy regulator said today the social media company has introduced ‘significant’ steps to uphold users’ own personal data rights when training its AI system with public Instagram and Facebook content. The Irish Data Protection Commission said Meta has been ‘responsive’ to its requests to carry out its recommendations concerning the potential impact on individuals’ data protection rights when teaching its AI model with public posts from adults. Meta first unveiled its plans to commence training of a Large Language Model in March 2024. The company halted the plans after the Irish watchdog highlighted several privacy shortcomings. AI systems, especially Large Language Models, are often trained with vast amounts of data gathered on the open internet without much separation between personal and non-personal data. Pressure groups, such......