On July 22, 2026, the Federal Communications Commission (the “FCC”) voted to approve a Report and Order (the “Order”) and Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (the “FNPRM”) that will rework and modernize the FCC’s satellite licensing regime.  Stating that “[a]chieving American space superiority is critical to our nation’s future,” the Order streamlines the FCC’s satellite application and licensing procedures to support commercial deployment of space infrastructure.  The Order also relocates and reorganizes the current part 25 satellite licensing rules to a new part 100.  The FNPRM seeks public comment on how the FCC can further modernize its space technology regime.  The Order and FNPRM follow a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking from October 2025 (the “NPRM”), which we previously covered.

Continue Reading FCC Approves Massive Modernization of Satellite Licensing Regime

On July 22, the Federal Communications Commission (the “FCC”) approved a Report and Order (the “Order”) to simplify the requirements for the broadband consumer label (the “Label”) that all ISPs have been required to provider to consumers since 2024.  The Order is meant to “refocus the rules on ensuring that consumers have the clear, accurate, and concise information about broadband plans” while reducing compliance burdens on providers.  See below for a summary of the key updates.

Continue Reading FCC Simplifies Broadband Consumer Label Requirements

On 10 July 2026, Ofcom published a package of draft materials as part of the third phase of its implementation of the Online Safety Act (the “Act”). While the Act already imposes baseline duties to tackle illegal content and to protect children (where a service is likely to be accessed by them) on all regulated user-to-user and search services, the 10 July package provides a set of additional duties targeted at the UK’s largest and most widely used online services.

The package is comprised of three connected strands:

  • The Register of Categorised Services. Ofcom published its long-awaited register, formally designating services across Category 1, Category 2A, and Category 2B, together with a list of “emerging” Category 1 services.
  • Consultation: Draft Fraudulent Advertising Codes of Practice (Category 1 and 2A): The draft codes of practice set proposed measures for how the largest user-to-user and search services should tackle paid-for fraudulent advertising.
  • Consultation: Draft Additional Duties Code of Practice and Guidance (Category 1 only): The draft codes of practice and associated guidance address user empowerment and identity verification, protections for certain public-interest content, terms of service, complaints, and freedom-of-expression and privacy assessments.

This post focuses on the third strand—the additional duties for Category 1 services.

Continue Reading UK online safety update: Ofcom’s Category 1 proposals and DSIT’s latest response to “Growing Up in an Online World”

State regulators are beginning to grapple with the implications of the Supreme Court’s recent decision in National Republican Senatorial Committee v. FEC (“NRSC”).  Minnesota may have provided the first clear example of how the ruling could reshape state campaign finance regimes. On June 30, the Supreme Court struck down the federal limits on coordinated party expenditures, holding that political parties have a First Amendment right to spend unlimited amounts in coordination with candidates and rejecting the argument that such limits are necessary to prevent corruption. Although the Court did not directly address limits on party-to-candidate contributions or in-kind contributions, the decision immediately raised questions about the constitutionality of such limits, particularly in jurisdictions that, unlike federal law, do not distinguish between coordinated expenditures and in-kind contributions. Minnesota’s response suggests that answers may be arriving sooner than expected.

Continue Reading Early Post-NRSC Domino Falls: Minnesota Stops Enforcing Limits on Certain Party In-Kind Contributions

On June 2, 2026, Colorado Governor Jared Polis vetoed HB 26-1210, a bill that would have imposed requirements for use of “surveillance data” to set individualized prices for consumers or individualized wage setting for workers. The veto is yet another action in a trend of bills focused on regulating “surveillance” or “dynamic” pricing.

Continue Reading Colorado Governor Vetoes Overly Broad Algorithmic Pricing and Wage Setting Bill

On July 9, 2026, the Court of Justice of the European Union (“CJEU” or “Court”) delivered its judgment in Sky Österreich Fernsehen (C-234/25), deciding that a streaming offering constitutes a digital service under the Consumer Rights Directive (Directive 2011/83/EU), rather than digital content, where the trader’s offering is of a dynamic nature and goes beyond the stable or continuous provision of specific content. As a result, providers of such streaming offerings cannot rely on the Consumer Rights Directive’s exception to the right of withdrawal for digital content.

The judgment has broad implications for providers of personalised digital services, as it affects whether consumers can cancel a subscription during the 14-day withdrawal period and, if they do, how much providers may charge for use of the service during that period.

Continue Reading CJEU Clarifies the Conditions for Seizure of Business Emails During Competition Inspections

It’s a common scenario: An employee receives a text from a friend asking them to contribute to the campaign of a candidate the friend supports. Without thinking much about it, the employee makes a $500 contribution. Though the employee has been trained on their company’s political contributions policy, it doesn’t…

Continue Reading Election Year Reminder: Pay-to-Play Risks Are Easy to Miss and Costly to Fix

On 3 June 2026, the European Commission published several legislative and policy measures wrapped up in one “tech sovereignty” package (see our posts summarising the package as a whole here, and diving deeper into the Cloud and AI Development Act here). But the EU’s tech sovereignty drive has a long history, and is by no means limited to this package.

In this post, we take a closer look at the current and forthcoming EU legislative measures aimed at increasing the resilience of services provided in the EU against external, malicious influence, a key aspect of tech sovereignty. Relevant legislation falls into two broad categories: (1) laws promoting cyber resilience generally, to prevent malicious actors from disrupting services and critical infrastructure; and (2) laws focused on building supply chain resilience and reducing dependencies on certain external actors by building European industrial capacity in key tech sectors.

Continue Reading Looking beyond the tech sovereignty package: how the EU is moving to ensure tech sector resilience

What’s changing, and why is it important?

In July 2026, the Ministry of Economy & Tourism of the United Arab Emirates (the “Ministry” and “UAE”) published its Guidelines on Relevant Market Definition (the “Guidelines”), providing a detailed look into the Ministry’s framework for market definition assessment. The Ministry considers market definition to be a “fundamental pillar” to the competitive assessment across all competition enforcement contexts and a “crucial stage” in competition enforcement.

The issuance of the Guidelines marks a further important step in the implementation of the UAE’s competition law regime. It follows the introduction of revised merger control thresholds in 2025 and the adoption in April 2026 of implementing regulations for the 2023 Federal Competition Law (see our previous blog on these reforms).

The Guidelines are particularly important for the UAE’s merger control regime, where filing obligations are dependent on parties meeting revenue and/or market share thresholds in the “relevant market” in the UAE. The introduction of the Guidelines provides a crucial tool to merging parties and advisers for determining when transactions may require mandatory notification to the Ministry. More substantively, the Guidelines will provide an important source to help merging parties prepare the “economic report” on the competitive effects of a merger required by the UAE merger notification rules. Beyond merger control, the Guidelines will also provide an important tool for self-assessment of behavioural competition law compliance.

Continue Reading UAE Antitrust Regime Marks an Important Step with the Introduction of Market Definition Guidelines

This update highlights key legislative and regulatory developments in the second quarter of 2026 related to artificial intelligence (“AI”), connected and automated vehicles (“CAVs”), and Internet of Things (“IoT”).

Continue Reading U.S. Tech Legislative & Regulatory Update – Second Quarter 2026