Blog posts

Handley Gill Limited has been shortlisted for the 2025 Cybersecurity and Resilience Awards for its campaign to get company directors and charity trustees to address cyber security and business resilience, including in respect of their supply chains, and its success in lobbying the Institute of Directors to recognise risk management and business resilience as a core tenet of responsible business in its Code of Conduct for Directors.

Handley Gill’s specialist data protection consultants highlight the increase by an average of 29.9% in the data protection fee payable to the Information Commissioner with effect from 17 February 2025, and consider what controllers and the public can expect from the data protection regulator as a consequence.

This Safer Internet Day 2025, Handley Gill considers recent developments and reports on the UK government’s policy stance on the regulation of Big Tech and how Labour’s ambitions have been tempered since President Trump’s inauguration, particularly in relation to online safety and artificial intelligence, and even pandering to AI developers by taking steps toward reforming copyright laws restricting data mining for AI training.

Handley Gill’s specialist data protection consultants report on peers’ final consideration of the Data (Use and Access) Bill at Third Reading on 05 February 2025, when the Government was defeated by Baroness Owen’s amendments in relation to non-consensual deepfake intimate image offences, before the Bill was sent to the House of Commons.

As the deadline for online services to conduct an illegal harms risk assessment/illegal content risk assessment under the Online Safety Act 2023 approaches, Handley Gill’s specialist online safety consultants consider the implications of the posting of illegal content on popular online forum Mumsnet for online services subject to the online safety regime and the efficacy of the regime for preventing users from encountering illegal content in light of Ofcom’s guidance.

Handley Gill’s specialist responsible AI consultants highlight the provisions of the EU AI Act coming into force on 02 February 2025 which ban certain AI practices within the EU, including manipulative or deceptive techniques, exploiting vulnerabilities, social scoring, predictive policing, facial recognition databases based on scraping, emotion recognition at school or work, biometric categorisation and real time biometric identification in public spaces for law enforcement, as well as new positive obligations on AI developers and deployers relating to AI literacy.

Handley Gill’s specialist responsible artificial intelligence (AI) consultants consider the requirements of the new Code of Practice for the Cyber Security of AI published by the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology and highlight the implications of the Code of Conduct for stakeholders in the AI lifecycle.

Handley Gill’s specialist data protection consultants discuss the history of Data Protection Day and propose methods to utilise the celebration of the anniversary to further your organisation’s data protection compliance in line with this year’s theme ‘A New Mandate for Data Protection’ in light of emerging technologies and legislative change.

Handley Gill’s specialist responsible AI consultants consider the requirements of the government’s AI Management Essentials (AIME) self-assessment tool, and address their adequacy in response to the government’s consultation, their role in establishing responsible AI management systems and processes and informing public procurement of AI models and their interaction with the Algorithmic Transparency Recording Standard (ATRS).

Get your tickets to Enterprise Nation’s StartUp Show 2025, download the app and book an appointment with us to get free legal and regulatory compliance advice on 25 January 2025. We can’t wait to meet you.

Handley Gill Limited’s specialist responsible AI consultants summarise the UK government’s AI Opportunities Action Plan prepared by Matt Clifford CBE and published on 13 January 2025, identifying and analysing the key recommendations affecting data protection, AI regulation, intellectual property and copyright and, ESG.

Handley Gill’s specialists responsible artificial intelligence (AI) consultants consider the implications of the new mandatory public sector algorithmic transparency recording standard for public sector bodies deploying AI models and other algorithmic tools, as well as for AI developers who wish to retain the confidentiality of their commercially sensitive AI models.

As the Data (Use and Access) Bill continues its passage through the House of Lords, Handley Gill’s specialist data protection consultants summarise the fourth and final scrutiny session of the House of Lords’ Grand Committee on the Data (Use and Access) Bill on 18 December 2024, when peers continued their consideration of the provisions of Part 5 of the Data (Use and Access) Bill on ‘Data protection and privacy’, and Parts 6-8.

Handley Gill’s specialist ESG and human rights consultants consider the matters that financial entities should be considering when assessing their third party ICT service providers’ compliance with ethical and social responsibilities under Article 6(1)(f) Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2024/1773 and the EU Digital Operational Resilience Act (DORA).

With just one month until the EU Digital Operational Resilience Act becomes applicable, Handley Gill’s consultants examine the requirements imposed by DORA on financial entities and, by extension, their third party ICT service providers in relation to their contractual arrangements and obligations to provide information, and identify where financial entities may be seeking to impose adverse commercial terms on their supply chain under the guise of DORA compliance.

As the Data (Use and Access) Bill continues its passage through the House of Lords, Handley Gill’s specialist data protection consultants summarise third scrutiny session of the House of Lords’ Grand Committee on the Data (Use and Access) Bill on 16 December 2024, when peers continued their consideration of the provisions of Part 5 of the Data (Use and Access) Bill on ‘Data protection and privacy’.

Handley Gill’s specialist responsible artificial intelligence (AI) consultants summarise the UK government’s consultation on Copyright and Artificial Intelligence and consider the implications of the proposed copyright reforms for rights holders.

As the Data (Use and Access) Bill continues its passage through the House of Lords, Handley Gill’s specialist data protection consultants summarise the second scrutiny session of the House of Lords’ Grand Committee on the Data (Use and Access) Bill on 10 December 2024, when peers began their consideration of the provisions of Part 5 of the Data (Use and Access) Bill on ‘Data protection and privacy’.

As the Data (Use and Access) Bill continues its passage through the House of Lords, Handley Gill’s specialist data protection consultants summarise the first session of the House of Lords’ Grand Committee’s scrutiny of the Data (Use and Access) Bill on 03 December 2024.

In a comprehensive briefing, the Handley Gill’s specialist data protection consultants analyse the provisions of the Labour government’s Data (Use and Access) Bill (HL Bill 40 2024-25) as introduced in the House of Lords on 23 October 2024, the latest attempt after the Data Protection and Digital Information Bill to reform UK data protection law, as set out in the UK GDPR, Data Protection Act 2018, Data Protection Act 1998 and the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations 2003 (PECR).

Handley Gill’s specialist data protection consultants have prepared unofficial Keeling schedules showing track change mark ups of the changes proposed by the Data (Use & Access) Bill (HL Bill 40) to the Data Protection Act 2018, UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) and Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations 2003 (PECR) respectively. Download for free and sign up for updates on the Bill.

In the first Parliamentary debate on police use of live facial recognition technology, significant concerns were raised in relation to the latitude afforded to chief officers in deploying the biometric artificial intelligence (AI) tool. Handley Gill’s specialist consultants, whose advice on the deployment of LFR was acknowledged during the debate, consider the implications of the new Labour government’s proposals to revisit the legislative and regulatory framework governing the deployment of live facial recognition by law enforcement.

New guidance on good industry practice for directors issued by the Institute of Directors obliges directors and boards to identify and mitigate information and cyber security risks, and to prioritise business resilience, bringing a renewed focus to cyber resilience and supply chain security.    

Handley Gill’s specialist ESG consultants consider the implications for company directors of the Institute of Directors’ recommendations for corporate governance best practice as set out in its voluntary Code of Conduct for Directors, and identify practical measures executive and non-executive directors can take to meet good industry practice in complying with the responsible business principle. Download our free primer on directors’ statutory duties under the Companies Act 2006 and best practice principles of the Institute of Directors’ Code of Conduct for Directors.

The new Labour government has today (23 October 2024) introduced the Data (Use and Access) Bill in the House of Lords, in the latest attempt to reform the UK’s data protection laws as set out in the UK GDPR, Data Protection Act 2018, Data Protection Act 1998 and Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations.

While the sale of marketing lists is generally prohibited, as retail insolvencies increase Handley Gill’s specialist data protection consultants analyse the Information Commissioner’s laissez-faire approach to the purchase and use of the CRM databases of companies in administration and consider the opportunity this offers to administrators and potential purchasers of distressed businesses by reference to the recent case studies of Tesco’s purchase of Paperchase’s assets and the sale of The Body Shop’s assets.  

Unlike the Chemical Brothers, Prime Minister Keir Starmer called on regulators to hold back in order to galvanise economic growth in his speech to the International Investment Summit on 14 October 2024. We consider the implications for UK regulation of artificial intelligence (AI), digital markets and data protection by the ICO, CMA and Regulatory Innovation Office, and forthcoming legislation.

With employers having a matter of weeks to implement reasonable measures to prevent sexual harassment at work to comply with the requirements of the Worker Protection (Amendment of Equality Act 2010) Act 2023, Handley Gill's consultants identify the steps employers should take to establish a sexual harassment prevention programme and associated data protection compliance measures. As Labour's Employment Rights Bill would expand the scope of the employer's duty to take all reasonable measures and to address threats posed by third parties, employers should consider voluntarily expanding the scope of their programme now.

If you couldn’t make it to the Information Commissioner's Office's (ICO's) Data Protection Practitioners' Conference 2024 (DPPC24), missed a session, were double-booked, couldn’t choose or want to delve deeper into the issues raised by any of the following sessions, Handley Gill's specialist data protection consultants highlight our related content.

Handley Gill's specialist data protection consultants consider the status of CJEU judgments in UK law after the Labour government intervened to prevent section 6 Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Act 2023 from coming into force and amending the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018, and consider several CJEU judgments addressing the processing of special category personal data, the interaction between data protection and competition law, the conduct and balancing of legitimate interests assessments, data minimisation and the status of supervisory authority decisions.