Data Featured

The EU's age verification app launched: technically ready, legally awkward?

The European Commission launched an age verification app this week. This is likely to serve as a start for a broader legislative initiative to legalise age-verification and subsequent restrictions on minors.

Best practices Featured

Empowering children online: the CoE is skeptical of blanket social media bans

As politicians rush to impose blanket social media bans on minors, recent Council of Europe recommendations urge a smarter approach. They stress that online safety measures must protect children without sacrificing their freedom of expression or cutting off essential digital access

Data Featured

The EU’s roadworthiness package risks reversing course on open data

While the EU works to simplify data rules and boost Europe’s data economy, the incoming Roadworthiness Package may restrict vehicle data sharing to public authorities only - potentially shutting out private European companies and weakening consumer choice.

Privacy Featured

€500 billion-worth European data economy troubles continue

As AI grabs the spotlight, Europe’s data economy still powers billions in value, yet fragmented GDPR enforcement continues to hold innovators back. The Digital Omnibus was meant to help, but the EU now risks retreating from even modest reform.

DMA Featured

Is the DMA a chicken or a duck? Why the DMA predestinates European companies and consumers to lose

“If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck.” The DMA looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck — yet many insist it is a chicken.

Innovation Featured

Regulatory roadblocks for commercial use of drones in Europe

While drones are driving innovation across industries, European agriculture still lags in unlocking their full potential - not for lack of promise, but because regulation keeps that innovation grounded.

News Featured

Digital services taxes begin driving up consumer prices for ads

Although Brussels often overlooks how new taxes and regulations are passed on to consumers, the impact is already becoming clear: Meta advertisers have been told that “location fees” of 2% to 5% will apply in several European countries, with rates subject to change.

News Featured

Taxpayer-funded European social media platform?

A group of activists want the EU Commission to help build a “society-funded” European social network. The Commission has now registered a Citizens’ Initiative, triggering up to 18-month, 1-million-signature push, while questions remain on cost, procurement, and timeline.

Privacy Featured

Scientists urge moratorium on teen social media age verification

405 scientists from 30 countries warn teen social-media bans and age checks can backfire. In a Monday statement, they urge a moratorium until evidence is clearer, citing easy circumvention, migration to risky fringe sites, and years-long infrastructure hurdles.

Global Featured

American rights to free speech vs. European rights to set their own rules

Europeans and Americans talk past each other while rivals watch. The EU can set its own standards, but in an interconnected economy, decoupling fantasies and grandstanding won’t help.

Connectivity Featured

Sovereign solutions for me, but not for thee: 5G version

The Commission’s revised Cybersecurity Act may face resistance from China-friendly Member States and telecom operators, who warn of high compliance and vendor-switch costs and seek public reimbursement.

Data Featured

Why TikTok’s DSA investigation is important

Last week the European Commission preliminarily found TikTok may breach the DSA over “addictive design” (infinite scroll, autoplay, push alerts, personalised feeds). If upheld, it could mean a fine up to 6% of global turnover.

Connectivity Featured

Cold (space) war: why the US and the EU are still in the same boat

Ukraine and SpaceX announced they have found a way to prevent Russian armed forces from using Starlink, while Russian propagandists reacted harshly - not only toward SpaceX, but toward Palantir too. Meanwhile, communications from two European satellites were intercepted by Russian spacecraft.

Wiser Regulation Featured

Better regulation: speed should not become a substitute for transparency

On February 4, the Commission closed its Better Regulation consultation: most of the 286 respondents urged keeping impact assessments and consultation tools strong.

Connectivity Featured

Confusing messaging on potential network fees at the ITRE committee

At ITRE, EVP Henna Virkkunen pitched the Digital Networks Act. The DNA's Articles 191–193 revive fears of de facto network fees, and S&D’s Mattias Ecke pressed for safeguards. The Commission offered little clarity and hinted it could later “revise” the mechanism.

AI Featured

Estonian ambition to leverage AI: 50% GDP increase by 2035

Estonia just launched eesti.AI project, targeting +25% GDP by 2030 and +50% by 2035, by pairing AI with its digital-state know-how and public-private partnerships to deliver scalable AI applications .

Wiser Regulation Featured

Italo-German competitiveness to-do list for Europe

Merz and Meloni’s updated Italo-German Plan of Action doubles down on legislative self-restraint, simplification, and better regulation. The real test now is the Omnibus push and a Better Regulation reform.

Connectivity Featured

Digital Networks Act: backdoors for network fees and more

The Commission’s draft Digital Networks Act would replace the 2018 EECC and reopen old fights: less national control over spectrum, a costly copper switch-off by 2035, and a “voluntary” conciliation backdoor that could revive de facto network fees.

AI Featured

Who uses AI in Europe - and where it’s still taboo

The EU is funding AI adoption, drafting preparedness plans, and issuing ethics guidance, but AI tool use remains uneven and sometimes taboo. With 64% of Europeans saying AI literacy will be essential by 2030, the real test is turning ambition into measurable, high-scale outcomes.

Innovation Featured

Europe will not be sovereign behind walls

As digital sovereignty rises on the agenda, Denmark’s Minister for Digital Affairs, Caroline Stage, and Danish Entrepreneurs’ Peter Kofler argue Europe won’t secure its future by turning inward, but by boosting competitiveness, innovation, and scaling in an open global economy.

News Featured

2026: a year for preparation and a sharper focus

2026 is the EU’s digital “set-up” year: a time to simplify rules, set priorities, and brace for transatlantic spillovers as major legislative initiatives race toward 2027.

Featured

Time to tone down the arrogance - we need the 28th regime to be ambitious

In 2026 Q1, the Commission will propose the 28th regime - an EU-wide regime for corporate law. It won’t fix everything, but it’s a real test: do we build a single market for founders, or another paper initiative?

Featured

Between a rock and a hard place: Europe needs a mental shift in 2026

The world that many generations of Europeans, especially Western Europeans, have been used to is now gone, and a change in perspective is needed. Either we do it willingly, or worsening circumstances will force that change upon us.

News Featured

US threatens European companies (and why it may not have the desired effect)

US trade officials warned on X that European service providers could face fees and restrictions if the EU keeps “discriminatory” tech rules.

AI Featured

Europe has both a competitiveness and a fantasy-thinking problem

As EU governments discuss the Digital Omnibus, Europe is divided: some see the Omnibus as a necessary step to help European companies, while others cling to rules like the GDPR and the AI Act.