LL4S1      Half Unit
Cyberlaw

This information is for the 2023/24 session.

Teacher responsible

Professor Andrew Murray

Availability

This course is available on the LLM (extended part-time), LLM (full-time), MSc in Regulation and University of Pennsylvania Law School LLM Visiting Students. This course is available with permission as an outside option to students on other programmes where regulations permit.

This course does not require an in-depth understanding of contemporary computer technology.

This course has a limited number of places and demand is typically high. This may mean that you’re not able to get a place on this course.

Course content

This course examines and discusses topical issues in relation to law and technology systems. We begin by addressing issues relating to network regulation or control including questions such as “can internet-enabled communications be regulated?” and “who is competent to police online content and activity?”. We discuss whether the internet can and should be neutral and politically charged questions regarding regulation of platforms and regulation by platforms. In the second half of the term, we will delve further into these issues through topical examples such as AI and justice, tackling online “harms” and regulating online platforms and AI systems.

Students taking the course will be expected to develop knowledge and understanding of the different values brought to bear in the regulation of new media technologies and communities formed through such technologies and the factors leading towards choices of particular values, regulatory institutions and process. Such knowledge and understanding will operate both at the theoretical level and the level of particular examples of regulatory regimes. Students will be expected to apply organisational and analytical skills to the investigation of evidence and problems and show effective communication through written work and seminar discussion. Students shall research an assessed extended essay.

Teaching

This course will have 20 hours of teaching content in Autumn Term. There will be a Reading Week in Week 6.

Formative coursework

Students should submit an essay plan and working bibliography for the assessed essay. All students are expected to contribute to a series of class and online exercises, and to submit one 2,000 word formative essay.

Indicative reading

  • Murray, Information Technology Law: The Law and Society (OUP, 5th ed, 2023)
  • Edwards (ed), Law, Policy and the Internet (Hart, 2018)
  • Reed & Murray, Rethinking the Jurisprudence of Cyberspace (Edward Elgar, 2020)
  • Frank Pasquale: New Laws of Robotics: Defending Human Expertise in the Age of AI (Belknap, 2020)
  • Murray, The Regulation of Cyberspace (Routledge, 2007)
  • Reed, Making Laws for Cyberspace (OUP, 2012)
  • Lessig, Code Ver, 2.0 (Basic Books, 2006)
  • Custers & Fosch-Villaronga (Eds), Law and Artificial Intelligence (Springer, 2022)

Assessment

Essay (100%, 8000 words) in the ST.

Key facts

Department: Law School

Total students 2022/23: 29

Average class size 2022/23: 29

Controlled access 2022/23: Yes

Value: Half Unit

Guidelines for interpreting course guide information

Course selection videos

Some departments have produced short videos to introduce their courses. Please refer to the course selection videos index page for further information.

Personal development skills

  • Communication
  • Specialist skills