Università Roma Tre

BIG DATA. INTERNET OF THINGS, DATA DRIVEN INNOVATION
(prof. Vincenzo Zeno-Zencovich)
Seminar – 4 CFU
From March 2 to March 24, 2017
The seminar does not award legal language credits
The Seminar starts on Thursday, March 2, at 12 am in classroom 6 and continues on Fridays at 12 am (classroom 2) and Mondays at 4 pm (classroom 8).

The aim of the seminar is to render students aware of the social, economic and legal aspects of one of the most innovative areas of information and communication technologies (ICT).
Data have been qualified as the “new oil” of contemporary societies. Although the expression may be misleading, surely the next years will be marked by an enormous development of technologies able to collect, store and process amounts of data which are, for the moment, enumerable in billions of billions. This will be due not only to the increasing use by individuals of ICTs which will record very activity, but also by the dissemination of so called “Internet of the things”, i.e. objects, from extremely complex as an automobile, to extremely simple, as a food product, that will provide in real time information on their location, their environment, their use.
This can be an extraordinary opportunity for development – commonly defied as “Data-driven innovation” - but it presents also challenges that lawyers will have to face and try to resolve, such as the philosophical issues of self-determination and of free-will; in what legal category does data fall; the application of data protection laws; the contracts concerning the collection and trade of data; intellectual property rights over data and competition concerns. These are only some of the topics which will be presented and discussed in the seminar.

Methodology and Contents
The seminar will consist in a series of academic lectures devoted to the following topics:
Lesson 1: Networks and data processing: from a static approach to the present day dynamic environment
Lesson 2: Technological challenges in so-called “big-data”
Lesson 3: What is “Internet of the things” and what are its current and near-future applications
Lesson 4: The economic dimension: “Data-driven innovation”. The 2015 OECD Report
Lesson 5: Data as a legal entity
Lesson 6: Personal data protection issues
Lesson 7: Intellectual property, know how, trade secrets
Lesson 8: Data as a barrier to entry in markets and competition concerns
Lesson 9: Public data and open access to data
Lesson 10: “Data sovereignty” and “Data wars”
Lesson 11: Public and private decision-making and profiling
Lesson 12: The legal challenges ahead

Seminar Learning Objectives
The main aim is to understand how traditional legal notions and rules can cope with innovative aspects. Legal responses follow a millenary pattern which must be, intelligently, adapted to entirely different situations and contexts.

Class Methodology
It is expected from the students to attend the class regularly; to be punctual; to be focused; to participate and to interrupt the teacher for clarifications.
Students must be familiar with the assigned readings BEFORE the class.

Assessment
Attendance in class is compulsory. Student must attend no less than 3/4 of scheduled classes.
The evaluation of student’s achievement of the learning objectives will be done on a pass/fail basis taking into consideration the familiarity with requested reading; the level of participation in class discussion, and the shown ability to explore, analyse and understand the main issues dealt with in the Seminar.


e-mail contact: zencovic@uniroma3.it

Readings and course materials shall be provided during the course.