The purpose-vehicle'>special purpose vehicle established to make the acquisition in a public to private transaction.

See Offeror/bidder.

Big Brother Watch has filed a legal complaint with the UK’s Information Commissioner against PimEyes, an online facial recognition ‘search engine’. PimEyes enables anyone to upload images of a person to the website, which are processed by a facial recognition technology to find matches. There are no limits on the types of images that can be uploaded and no safeguards are in place to prevent users from extracting a library of photos of other individuals. The results returned in the searches include URLs to where the images are hosted, which can include the individual’s personal information. Big Brother Watch alleges this constitutes unlawful processing, is ‘deeply intrusive’ and that the search engine can be used to ‘surveil, harass and stalk’.

Law360, London: Anti-fraud campaigners are calling on the government to fine Big Tech companies such as Meta on repeated failures to prevent fraudulent financial advertising on their platforms with a tougher and wider regime than envisaged, with the consensus that social media is the biggest obstacle to combating investment scams.

MLex: Big tech companies are starting to face private litigation to force compliance with the EU's digital services law, raising questions about how these case could shape standards across the bloc. While national courts can force quick platform changes in their own country, they risk creating a patchwork of inconsistent legal obligations across the EU.

MLex: Tech giants like Amazon, Google and Microsoft are fielding EU questions over whether their partnerships with artificial intelligence developers contain exclusivity and non-compete clauses, MLex understands. Investigators want to know what different categories of AI the Big Tech companies are investing in, ranging from technology that responds to text prompts with text to technology that translates text prompts into images, audio or code.

Law360: The Big Four accounting firms expressed broad support for Ireland's plans to introduce corporate tax exemptions for foreign-sourced dividends and foreign branch profits, saying the changes are long overdue and would reduce complexities for taxpayers, according to comments published 7 February 2024.

Law360: Ireland should retool its research and development tax credit system, such as by increasing the credit's rate, to continue attracting investment in a changing international tax landscape, the Big Four accounting firms said in comments released Monday.

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and Payment Systems Regulator (PSR) have published a feedback statement FS25/1 following their joint Call for Information (CFI) on big tech and digital wallets. The statement highlights the rapid growth of digital wallets in the UK, with card transactions using digital wallets increasing from 8% in 2019 to 29% in 2023, predominantly through Apple Pay and Google Pay. The FCA and PSR emphasise their commitment to supporting growth and innovation through initiatives like Open Banking and Open Finance, aligning with their responses to the Prime Minister's call for accelerating digital innovation. Stakeholder feedback identified significant opportunities for innovation and growth but also raised concerns about competition, consumer protection, and operational resilience. Key issues include competition between digital wallets, competition between payment systems within digital wallets, operational resilience, and the regulatory framework.

The Payments Systems Regulator (PSR) and Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) have launched a joint call for information seeking views on the benefits and risks of digital wallets. Responses are sought by 13 September 2024.

Bigamy refers to going through a ceremony of marriage while already lawfully married to another person, where the first marriage has not been dissolved or annulled and the spouse is still alive. In legal practice it covers both religious and civil ceremonies that purport to create a valid second marriage.In England and Wales and Northern Ireland, bigamy is a statutory criminal offence under the Offences Against the Person Act 1861, requiring proof of a subsisting valid first marriage and a second purported marriage, subject to limited statutory defences (for example, a reasonable belief that the first spouse is dead or that the marriage has been legally ended). Scotland treats bigamy as a common law crime, with similar elements. In Ireland, bigamy is a statutory offence under the Criminal Justice (Theft and Fraud Offences) Act 2001.Bigamy also has civil law consequences, including the second “marriage” being void, with knock-on effects for financial provision, succession, pensions and immigration status. It is often relevant in family, probate and immigration litigation where the validity of a marriage is in dispute.

Family analysis: Despite still being married to another man at the time of the relevant marriage ceremony, the ‘wife’ in the case successfully resisted the ‘husband’s’ application to strike out her financial remedy application. The wife’s chief legal argument was that, following the Supreme Court’s judgment in Wyatt v Vince and its constraining effect on the scope of the Family Procedure Rules 2010 (FPR 2010), SI 2010/2955, r 4.4(1) concerning strike-out applications, it was no longer possible to strike out the financial remedy claims of a culpable individual pursuant to the authorities concerning bigamy and financial remedy (ie Whiston v Whiston and Rampal v Rampal (No 2)). This argument was rejected and the court found in crystal-clear terms that the Whiston jurisdiction is based on the ex turpi causa principle (a person shall not profit from their wrongdoing) and that the family court is empowered to strike out a claim where it ‘contravenes a rule of public policy to such an extent that to permit it to proceed would be an abuse of process’, provided the strike-out application falls within FPR 2010, SI 2010/2955, r 4.4(1) (paras [94], [90]). Accordingly, the Whiston jurisdiction has survived Wyatt. The victory for the husband was pyrrhic, and his application was refused on the basis (inter alia) that he was also aware that the wife was already married at the date of their marriage ceremony. Like the ‘wife’ in Rampal, the husband had not been misled, and there were good public policy reasons for the wife’s financial remedy claims to proceed—indeed, this is the purpose of the Matrimonial Causes Act 1973 allowing for those claims in respect of a nullity petition (para [98]). David Wilkinson, solicitor at Slater Heelis, looks at the considerations.