On 23 and 24 January 2023, the project team of the AHRC/DfG-funded research project “From Smart Technologies to Smart Consumer Laws” held a working meeting at the University of Warwick. The project focuses on a range of consumer challenges created by the Internet of Things (IoT), which is characterised by a complex integration of physical and digital products and services, e.g., in the context of smart homes, connected vehicles or consumer wearables.

The purpose of the meeting was to discuss the findings of the initial phase and to map out the next phase, which will concentrate to analysing the relevant laws in the UK and in Germany in four particular areas: liability in the IoT, things as services, ‘bricking’ as regulation, and IoT enabled personalisation.

Warwick Law School’s Professor Christian Twigg-Flesner is working together with Associate Professor Dr Guido Noto La Diega (Stirling) and Professors Christoph Busch (Osnabrück) and Louisa Specht-Riemenschneider (Bonn) on this project. It started in February 2022 and is due to be completed in early 2025.

The overarching objective of the project is to identify and analyse the ways in which the IoT challenges established legal approaches and areas where law needs to adapt. It does so from the perspective of German and English/Scots law, combining very different legal traditions. Its output will include a co-authored monograph and two focused journal articles.

Professor Twigg-Flesner said “It has become increasingly difficult to map existing consumer law onto the features of the new business models promoted through the Internet of Things. Our project will offer both an analysis of current laws and explore the potential from ground-breaking law reform to make consumer law smarter.”

For further information about the project, visit https://www.stir.ac.uk/about/faculties/arts-humanities/law-and-philosophy/law-research/human-rights/smart-technology-and-consumer-protection/