If implemented, a proposal on online harms would restrict legitimate content without due process, hurt digital businesses, limit access to information and, by creating state regulation of speech, damage freedom of expression for millions of users.

Europe
One year later, there is mounting evidence that the law has not produced its intended outcomes; moreover, the unintended consequences are severe and widespread.
A survey of allied think tanks summarizes what 23 nations and the EU are doing best when it comes to innovation policy, and where there are the greatest opportunities to improve. In many cases, the successes can serve as model policies for other countries to adopt.
As Daniel Castro and Eline Chivot write for European Views, results of recent survey data show that the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)—which the EU has touted as the gold standard for data protection rules—has had no impact on consumer trust in the digital economy since it came into force last May.
Offshoring is widely maligned for reducing manufacturing employment in advanced economies. However, by lowering costs and utilizing global value chains, firms that outsource can afford to increase their investments and funding for higher-productivity jobs, making the overall economic implications less clear.
China’s patent output has grown dramatically in recent years, both in terms of the volume of patents submitted for international protection under the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) and in terms of the number of citations those patents receive, a standard measure of a patent’s importance. New research breaking down the sources of those citations raises significant doubts about whether the growth in Chinese patent citations is as meaningful as it appears.
ITIF endorses USTR’s proposed imposition of countermeasures, in the form of additional tariffs, commensurate with what the WTO’s Dispute Settlement Body has found to be adverse effects inflicted on U.S. aerospace competitors as a result of the EU’s WTO-inconsistent subsidy programs for large civil aircraft.
By providing remote access to data storage, processing, and software, cloud computing lets firms easily scale their computing needs and avoid the large fixed costs of IT infrastructure, which allows small firms to operate and expand more efficiently. New research into cloud adoption by firms in the United Kingdom supports this reasoning.
Europe’s success in the global algorithmic economy requires a regulatory environment that is fit for AI but does not reduce consumer protections.
While it may be tempting to focus on the direct job losses caused by robot adoption, it is wrong to conclude that automation constitutes a generalized threat to workers, either in manufacturing or in the broader economy. By choosing to automate, firms can increase their productivity, which allows them to expand and increase their employment.
The Fraunhofer Gesellschaft (FhG), a German nonprofit organization that conducts applied research, started about 6,500 projects per year with private firms between 1997 and 2014, and new research shows the firms reap substantial benefits from the collaboration.
Robots are key tools for boosting productivity and living standards, and companies around the world are putting them to use. But while Korea is the world’s largest adopter, with 710 robots per 10,000 workers, the United States sits at seventh, with 200 robots. Why does the United States lag behind?
ITIF's Center for Data Innovation discussed the progress that member states within the European Union have made to create and implement national AI strategies.
As Rob Atkinson writes for Germany’s Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Margarethe Vestager’s decision to veto a merger between rail companies Alstom and Siemens shows how preventing EU firms from merging will result in weakened and shrunken European competitors.
The European Union in 2007 established the Risk Sharing Finance Facility (RSFF) to improve access to debt financing for high-risk R&D projects by co-financing loans with private banks. A new study has analyzed the impact of the €18.2 billion that the RSFF invested from its inception through 2016.
The EU has an opportunity to make major strides in the next wave of digital transformation. But it will need to adopt a forward-looking policy perspective that focuses on the benefits of connectivity, automation, and smart systems for Europe’s economy and society.
A new study for the UK government calls for more aggressive antitrust enforcement against big Internet companies. It is likely to provide momentum to those who advocate for a fundamentally different approach to antitrust than the one pursued over the last 40 years, which would deter innovation, increase prices, and lower quality.
ITIF's Center for Data Innovation hosted a conversation about how the public and private sectors can work together to accelerate the use of Artificial Intelligence to combat fake news as the European Union prepares for its 2019 elections.
Both EDPS and CPDP have paid a lot of lip service to the importance of ethics. It is time to turn those words into actions and be clear about where it stands on an inappropriate and offensive recent statement by Giovanni Buttarelli.
When skilled workers migrate, it seems obvious that the destination country is gaining at the expense of the origin country, which is losing talent and potential sources of innovation. However, a new study has challenged the idea that migration is zero sum, finding that origin countries actually benefit from skilled workers moving abroad.
ITIF’s Center for Data Innovation submitted feedback to the European Commission’s High-Level Expert Group (HLEG) on AI on its draft AI Ethics Guidelines for Trustworthy AI. The guidelines aim to provide concrete guidance on how to implement and operationalize “trustworthy AI” systems that “maximize the benefits of AI while minimizing its risks.” While this goal is worthwhile, the guidelines have five main problems: 1) they present an overall negative tone towards AI; 2) they overlook the importance of EU leadership on AI adoption as a means of influencing global AI ethics; 3) they inc
From a skewed standardization law in China to mercantilist digital services tax proposals in Europe, when countries impose protectionist policies in high-value, high-tech sectors, they don’t just damage competitors; they damage the entire global innovation system.
Significant advances in Artificial Intelligence (AI) over the past decade have led to many debates about the potential social, economic, and security impact of AI. However, little sustained attention has been paid to the impact of AI on international relations or how the technology impacts the work of diplomats and policy makers.
If countries do not show proper restraint, they can easily sabotage the global Internet by imposing unreasonable obligations on companies and setting up scenarios where companies are forced into a no-win situation of having to comply with conflicting laws.
If Europe wants to set its own course in the new global order, then the most important first step is to join with America to fight for free trade and an open Chinese market.