Understand Your Rights. Solve Your Legal Problems
Following the recently deemed terrorist attacks in Westminster, London, calls were made for the ban of end-to-end encryption, such as that used by Whatsapp, the messaging platform indirectly blamed for being a tool of use by the alleged terrorists. This leaves many with the question: do those in positions of political power still think it unnecessary to understand technology?
This week’s ‘Your Thoughts’ has heard from many security specialists, researchers and legal professionals on the ins and outs of Whatsapp’s privacy protection debate.
Kyle Wilhoit, Senior Security Researcher, DomainTools:
The idea of having a perfect end-to-end encryption solution with backdoors embedded only for police sounds great, in theory. However, in practice, it's not possible. If a backdoor is embedded into an application or service, it's present for anyone to find and use. The only difference between police and criminals at that point is awareness of the backdoor and intent.
The ultimate victims are the end user and the organization required to comply with embedding vulnerabilities to allow for backdoors. Having embedded vulnerabilities leaves the end user vulnerable to criminals who leverage the backdoor that the organization willingly put into place. You can't necessarily control who finds or uses this vulnerability once the application is distributed and used.
Javvad Malik, Security Advocate, AlienVault:
Today, as we stand with technology and encryption deployment, backdoors simply aren’t possible. It’s an all or nothing approach. If backdoors are built in, then they could be exploited by anyone, not just authorised bodies.
Lee Munson, Security Researcher, Comparitech.com:
Westminster gets tough on terrorists. MPs clampdown on encrypted communications. Amber Rudd foils imminent attack while chatting on WhatsApp.
Gavin Millard, EMEA Technical Director, Tenable Network Security:
As the computational power, complexity and value of these devices increases, the probability they'll be targeted by cyber criminals to monetize security flaws will also rise. Smartphones are a particular weak spot, with cherished photos being stored and rarely backed up.
As with traditional IT equipment, it's important connected devices are kept up to date, applying fixes the vendors release in a timely manner.
David Meltzer, Chief Technology Officer, Tripwire:
You can have true end-to-end encryption that nobody but the participants can read, or you can have a system where a central authority can decrypt any message they want. It doesn’t make any sense to suggest that you can have both. It is either one or the other. It is a reasonable policy position to believe you should have a government backdoor in messaging systems, but this always worries security experts because that same backdoor you create for the government inevitably creates the potential for misuse, abuse, and being exploited by others.
David Emm, Principal Security Researcher, Kaspersky Lab:
The recent terrorist attack in Westminster has brought with it renewed questions about the use of end-to-end encryption by messaging services such as WhatsApp. In particular, the Home Secretary Amber Rudd has appealed to Internet companies to provide a way for government to inspect the communications of those suspected of criminal activity, for example terrorists. Others have even called for a blanket ban on end-to-end-encryption altogether.
In reality however, both of these approaches are flawed. The requirement for application vendors who use encryption to provide a way for government or law enforcement agencies to ‘see through’ encryption, poses some real dangers. Creating a ‘backdoor’ to decipher encrypted traffic is akin to leaving a key to your front door under the mat outside. Your intention is for it to be used only by those you have told about it. But if someone else discovers it, you’d be in trouble. Similarly, if a government backdoor were to fall into the wrong hands, cybercriminals, foreign governments or anyone else might also be able to inspect encrypted traffic - thereby undermining not only personal privacy, but corporate or national security. It would effectively create a zero-day (i.e. unpatched) vulnerability in the application.
This places application vendors in an invidious position. In response to growing privacy concerns in recent years, more vendors have implemented encryption to secure their customers’ communications. They’re unlikely to be happy about switching to a ‘snoopable’ form of encryption – as illustrated by the stand-off between Apple and the FBI last year.
A blanket ban on encryption would be just as dangerous. Law-abiding citizens and organisations would seek to comply with such legislation – compromising their privacy. But cybercriminals would either make use of encryption capabilities developed in another country (i.e. beyond the reach of the UK government), or implement encryption for themselves.
There’s an inherent tension between privacy and security. This isn’t going to disappear, although the emphasis may shift depending on the geo-political situation and security context at any given time. Amber Rudd must surely be conscious of the fact that there’s no way to restrict the use of encryption to honest, law-abiding citizens. However, at the same time, the government has made it clear that it wants organisations in the UK to protect themselves from cybercriminals and other would-be intruders. There are steps organisations can take to do this such as running fully updated software, performing regular security audits on their website code and penetration testing their infrastructure. However, since no company can guarantee 100% that its systems will not be breached, encryption is essential to ensure that such a breach doesn’t result in the loss of sensitive information. The best way for organisations to combat cyber-attacks is by putting in place an effective cyber-security strategy before the company becomes a target.
Julian Sheppard, Director Computer Forensics EMEA, KrolLDiscovery:
Can you imagine if this was a call to build in backdoor to access your end-to-end private banking transactions or your day-today credit card payment authorisations with Amazon? The problem comes with ensuring we do always have totally secure communication methods when we need them but also the need for us to trust that the people who design these apps do provide absolute security to end users. Of course, it’s unfortunate that terrorists will favour using any of these encrypted communication technologies over plain text especially as they know that messages in transit cannot be intercepted even by the best eyes and ears in the technology world.
Not only are messages transmitted with end-to-end encryption but when they are stored on a phone they are held in an encrypted database; this includes within any backups taken of the phone. Furthermore, the device is generally also protected from casual reading the messages in the WhatsApp app by a PIN or passcode preventing unauthorised access to the phone. Overcoming access to the phone can be problematic without the owner’s assistance (if not also risky or impossible) as we know from the Apple v FBI iPhone access incident involving the San Bernandino terrorist’s phone of 2015. Fear of wiping the device from too many failed PIN entries was enough to initially hold back the best investigators and seasoned forensic minds. However, the PIN entry was eventually circumvented and the data from the phone was gained. This is where our best hope presently lays with gaining access to messages sent using secure apps like WhatsApp – the constant battle between phone provider security and those forensic and hacker minds finding vulnerabilities in hardware and software designs. At the moment, overcoming issues like the PIN/Passcode barrier is the first hurdle and this will at least give us a chance to manually read the data on the phone, maybe even capture all of the data. This is a constant battle where we win some days, only to have the door close the next.
Finally, to the point of trusting apps to be secure. In 2014, Truecrypt ceased ongoing development with an announcement on their own website that ‘WARNING: Using TrueCrypt is not secure as it may contain unfixed security issues’. People quickly lost trust that it was secure and alternative secure methods were sought. I strongly believe that should users lose trust in WhatsApp security through any rumours or actual backdoors, they will quickly move onto the next secure communications method on the market.
Paul Holland, Founder and CEO, Beyond Encryption:
The Westminster Terror attack, and subsequent revelations regarding the usage of encryption, present challenges to all wishing to protect their identity and data as part of their civil rights. With Chancellor Hammond’s announcement about the government’s £1.9 billion investment in UK’s cyber-crime defences, encryption will remain at the heart of the debate.
Encryption mechanisms have existed for thousands of years serving the same purpose then as they do now, seeking to safeguard the user’s communications from unwanted eyes. The UK’s pride in its rich encryption heritage is clear to see from the significant funds that have been invested into Bletchley Park, home of the enigma code breakers, in recent years. In 2018 the UK will launch its first ever College of Cyber Security on the site.
Naturally the population want their civil rights to be respected when protecting their sensitive data, whilst still being protected by the shroud of counter terrorism legislation in cases where encryption mechanisms are abused for illegal purposes.
Encryption employs a mathematical equation and keys to ‘scramble’ messages thereby rendering them unreadable in the absence of the key (or multiple keys). By way of example, with typical ‘military grade’ encryption methodology; if every atom on earth (a lot of atoms) were a computer, each capable of trying ten billion keys a second, it would still take about 2.84 billion years before you reached the key that enabled you to ‘unscramble’ message.
It is here that No 10 and the Home Secretary have called for police and intelligence agencies to have access to messages transmitted using services such as those applicable to high profile social media services.
This presents significant challenges given that in many cases the above keys are held by the message sender/ recipient and, as already described, the ‘brute force’ mathematical power required to decrypt the unreadable ‘blob’ of data is impractical.
Brian Lord, Managing Director, PGI Cyber:
The aftermath of any horrific terrorist or criminal act always reignites the debate of “what level of absolute freedom should citizens be prepared to cede in order to help the State preserve the wider security and freedoms that society requires.” The privacy versus security debate raging around WhatsApp’s message content retention, storage and disclosure policy is simply a contemporary iteration.
We live in a world where modern technology can make most things technically possible. So, it is easy to find a purely technical solution that meets these inherent principles:
(a) service providers’ requirement to maintain and grow market share and meet clients’ needs;
(b) nation States’ need to keep its citizens safe from avoidable threats and expect those providing services to their nation to behave with respective social responsibility;
(c) consumers’ right to access technological products that improve business and private life, which includes the right to privacy.
But consumers’ voracious appetite for new technology growth, and the diluting nature the Internet has on international borders (for good and bad), means the actual solution cannot be a purely technical one. The challenge is major re-calibration: socially, politically and commercially (and ultimately legally) to what 21st Century “digital normality” looks like.
Service providers, such as WhatsApp/Facebook seek a legitimate global market for products, in a world where wider access to the Internet continues to increase global connectivity. And nations will have very different “national security” criteria against which data is needed from such providers within their respective jurisdictions. Some nations’ criteria will certainly be wholly unpalatable and unacceptable to standards imposed elsewhere in the world.
Yet it is not a sustainable position for a global telecommunications provider/enabler to ignore all these implications and seek institutional policies and agnostic infrastructure that simply abrogates them from managing these 21st Century dilemmas.
Terrorist attacks and criminal activity can never be stopped completely, but making it harder to commit such acts is the responsibility of everyone: state, industry and public alike.
Technology is not the problem. Whenever I give “Cyber” advice to clients, whether at national level to formulate national security policies, or to industry to strike the right balance between security and operational efficacy, it always the organisations’ sociological and behavioural inhibitors that obstruct safe exploitation of available technology. There is some way before we have properly adjusted, from both a risk and benefit perspective, to the dynamic world that we have created.
Helen Goldthorpe, Commercial and IT Associate, Shulmans LLP:
Since the Westminster attack, the inability to access WhatsApp messages has angered the intelligence services and Home Office, which have called for backdoor access to content. However, with no messages stored on its servers and with end-to-end encryption, the company stands firm on its position that it’s not technically possible to facilitate this without undermining its security protocols. As security is at the heart of its offering, WhatsApp is in fact under obligations to keep information secure in accordance with the Data Protection Act. When GDPR comes into force in 2018, WhatsApp will be perfectly placed for compliance with the “Privacy by Design” obligations it imposes, in addition to the new draft ePrivacy Regulation which will extend current laws on the security of electronic communications to “over the top” providers such as WhatsApp.
A second reason why WhatsApp is likely to be comfortable with the fact that it cannot currently access the content of messages is that this helps it to argue that the app is merely a “conduit” for messaging, preventing it having any liability under defamation, copyright infringement, anti-terrorism and other laws. Whilst its terms and conditions forbid the use of the service for instigating or encouraging illegal conduct, it is not in its interest to either actively monitor messages, or to amend them to remove such content. Even if it could, doing so may impose liability on WhatsApp if it is deemed to have knowingly distributed or published the content. By ensuring that it does not have access to the messages, WhatsApp minimises the risk of liability.
Although a release of data to the intelligence services under a warrant would not necessarily breach data protection laws, the legal position and market demand for security have led to the creation of a system where this isn’t technically feasible. Given that WhatsApp is unlikely to voluntarily make its system less secure, legislation (which arguably already exists in the Investigatory Powers Act 2016) would need to require the company to create a backdoor. In order to be useful, a legal obligation to store the messages after delivery may also be required. As well as leading to technical and commercial difficulties and a risk of simply moving the problem elsewhere, any such obligation is likely to be the subject of legal challenge. The Investigatory Powers Act 2016 itself replaces a law which was successfully challenged on privacy grounds.
Omri Sigelman, Co-founder & Chief Strategy and Product Officer, NURO Secure Messaging:
The UK Home Secretary wants encryption companies to be legally obliged to provide Governments investigating terrorist acts with the means to decrypt messages.
Already with the Investigatory Powers Bill, the British government has gone “further than any other Western democracy” in its expansion of surveillance powers and its ability to collect bulk data without justifiable reason. In seeking more controls over encryption, the UK government is in danger of repeating its mistake of using the law as a blunt instrument for subverting technology to its will.
Any move to hand nation states the power to decrypt messages simply undermines the privacy of businesses and ordinary consumers. Terrorists would simply find other ways to communicate.
I do believe, however, there is a strong case for outlawing WhatsApp in strictly regulated industries such as banking/finance and law. Last week it emerged that traders, bankers and money managers are using WhatsApp and similar apps as an easy, almost undetectable way to evade compliance. The trend is happening in legal firms too. Meanwhile the balance of power in terms of data rights is shifting away from companies towards individuals. At the same time fines for non-compliance will get heavier.
Once EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) comes into force from 2018, fines for major organisations could reach £70bn, while smaller businesses could see collective fines reaching £52bn. Against this backdrop legal firms need to ensure they have sufficient measures in place for managing employee behaviour in mobile group chats and total privacy control over the data they share.
A first step is to introduce new policies and procedures that specifically address what types of data can and cannot be shared in standard mobile group chat and collaboration sessions. Additionally, it is worth considering a secure messaging and collaboration platform built for business rather than consumer use. Such systems ensure client information remains private and secure at all times. Firms also retain full ownership of that data along with the encryption keys so they can prove compliance should they need to.
Adopting enterprise-class alternatives to WhatsApp for business communications and collaboration is a far more effective encryption strategy than handing over the keys for authoritarian governments, foreign spies and criminals to exploit.
We would also love to hear more of Your Thoughts on this, so feel free to comment below and tell us what you think!
Ahead of the start of the new financial year, BDO is warning people, especially those self-employed in services, to get their tax affairs in order, Dawn Register, partner at BDO, highlights for Lawyer monthly a few considerations.
Requirement to correct
The start of the new financial year should act as a significant time for any individual with any offshore tax activity to check through their affairs. The timeframe for people to voluntarily disclose prior to the deadline of 30th September 2018 is now considerably short. The tax legislation is incredibly complex, and individuals should check and double check to make sure that their UK filings are accurate. These filings should include anything from inherited offshore trusts or savings. Advisers are also going to feel under pressure to ensure there are no technical mistakes. By making this a legal requirement, HMRC is really giving teeth to the message that people who do not get their tax affairs in order will face severe consequences. Ignorance is no excuse.
Serial avoiders regime
HMRC has been shouting about avoidance wins for some time now, and with the start of a new financial year, will only want to ramp this up. It is worth noting that to be considered a serial avoider, someone only needs to be involved in one scheme. We expect avoiders to continue to see accelerated payment notices coming their way which allows HMRC to collect upfront payment of the disputed tax money. A significant struggle for participants approached by HMRC will be sourcing the cash to repay some, or all of the original tax relief they receive. Reviewing historical avoidance is crucial. Also, careful consideration is needed for new arrangements which HMRC could label 'avoidance'. Those participants involved in new schemes could face the lose of basic tax reliefs and be subject to HMRC’s new ‘naming and shaming’ laws with all the reputational risk and damage that ensues.
Tax dividends
The tax paid by individuals that are self-employed caused a huge furore in the past few weeks and attracted a lot of interest, with a notable and widely covered U-turn from the Chancellor. However, one measure around tax dividends remains and the self-employed who operate through personal service companies should use the new financial year as a time to review their tax affairs. The reduction in dividend tax allowance will see those who previously made use of the allowance facing higher tax bills. This might mean many people want to consider going into business alone using a personal service company, especially given that HMRC are now giving closer inspection to this area starting with those in the public sector. The loss of employment rights and wider employee benefits will also be factors to consider. The 'gig economy' debate continues!
The majority of older Trump voters believe a house bill imposes an unfair "age tax," oppose changes to medicaid, and want measures to lower cost of prescription drugs.
AARP has released the findings of a survey that said a majority of voters ages 50 plus – including most Trump supporters – oppose specific provisions of the bill that make health care more expensive for older Americans. The survey asked about multiple elements of the health care reform bill and also found that an overwhelming majority want action to lower drug costs.
"Older Americans want affordable health care – including less expensive prescription drugs and continued protections for the most vulnerable," said AARP Executive Vice President Nancy LeaMond. "When Americans over age 50 look at the details of the House health care reform plan, they don't like what they see. They don't want big insurance and drug companies to reap massive profits at their expense."
Specific findings of the survey include:
The survey also highlights that lowering the cost of prescriptions is a top priority for older Trump voters. A significant majority blames big drug companies for rising prices and support measures such as allowing Medicare to negotiate drug prices.
Survey Methodology: Benenson Strategy Group, in conjunction with GS Strategy Group, conducted 605 telephone interviews from March 10-13, 2017, with registered voters ages 50+ nationwide, who voted in the 2016 election. At the 95% confidence level, the margin of error for the entire sample is ± 4.0%. It is ± 5.7% among Trump voters. The full results of the poll may be found here.
(Source: AARP)
The Campaign to Repeal FATC, led by deVere Group CEO, Nigel Green, and the Center for Freedom and Prosperity led a coalition of 22 other groups, including Americans for Tax Reform and the National Taxpayers Union, calling on Congress to include repeal of the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) in any tax reform package sent to the White House.
The March 21st letter, addressed to Speaker of the House Paul Ryan, US Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady, and Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch, makes five key points:
Other coalition members that signed the letter are: American Commitment; Taxpayers Protection Alliance; Competitive Enterprise Institute; Frontiers of Freedom; R Street Institute; 60 Plus Association; The Market Institute; FreedomWorks; Center for Individual Freedom; Sovereign Society Freedom Alliance; Institute for Liberty; Institute for Policy Innovation; The National Tax Limitation Committee; Americans for Limited Government; Citizen Outreach; National Center for Policy Analysis; Campaign for Liberty; Jeffersonian Project; and Small Business and Entrepreneurship Council.
"FATCA has been ruining the lives of Americans abroad and pulling money out of the global financial system for no benefit. It's exactly the kind of counterproductive and burdensome regulatory scheme Donald Trump has pledged to get rid of," says Nigel Green, founder and CEO of deVere Group and co-leader of the Campaign to Repeal FATCA."
He continues: "I am thrilled to see US taxpayer advocate groups weighing in with Congress to repeal the Obama-era FATCA. It's time for citizens in other countries to show the same kind of backbone and help get this costly mistake off the statute books.”
Enacted in 2010 by a Democrat-controlled Congress and signed into law by Barack Obama, FATCA is virtually unknown to most Americans but has been wreaking havoc with the global financial system outside the US Touted as a weapon against "fat cat" tax evaders stashing funds offshore, FATCA is instead an indiscriminate information dragnet requiring all non-US financial institutions (banks, credit unions, insurance companies, investment and pension funds, etc.) in every country in the world to report data on all specified US accounts to the IRS.
"Every government has a right to see its laws enforced and tax evasion investigated and prosecuted. That's not what FATCA does, though. It has punished everybody, innocent as well as guilty, and consumers and taxpayers worldwide. It's a windfall for the compliance industry and no one else. Repeal FATCA!" added Green.
The 2016 Republican Platform calls for FATCA's repeal, denouncing the law's "warrantless seizure of personal financial information without reasonable suspicion or probable cause" and its threat to the "ability of overseas Americans to lead normal lives."
In his recent commentary published by The Hill on February 16, Green wrote: "When the Republican-controlled Congress moves forward with drafting comprehensive tax reform legislation to put on President Donald Trump's desk, one item ought to be high on the list of provisions but probably isn't yet — repealing the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA)… It's time for the Trump administration and the bicameral GOP leadership to honor the party's pledge to get rid of this senseless, invasive, dictatorial, and costly burden."
(Source:
In an industry first, IPC Systems, Inc., recently announced the launch of the IPC Compliance Policy Engine, a new comprehensive software innovation that automates proactive compliance adherence and mitigates risk by financial trading communications and information governance. IPC’s Compliance Policy Engine rollout is part of the company’s growing Risk & Compliance portfolio of services and solutions.
“With regulations such as Dodd-Frank, MAR, and MiFID II, capital market participants face the increasing burden of both interpreting the impact of regulations and demonstrating they are properly enforcing policies,” said Lionel Grosclaude, senior vice president, Risk & Compliance at IPC. “Financial companies today are not only liable if their employees are out of compliance, but if their supervisory and management systems do not adequately monitor and mitigate risks. IPC’s new Compliance Policy Engine is purpose-built for trader voice communications, empowering firms with easy to implement technology that establishes, maintains and helps automate policy enforcement.”
IPC Compliance Policy Engine can help firms stay compliant by allowing companies to establish, enforce, and supervise communications policies that, based on roles and organisational structure, appropriately permit or block voice communications between groups of employees or individuals in order to comply with global Material Non-Public Information Disclosure and Conflict of Interest regulations.
“Proactively managing trading communications and information governance risks will enable financial services firms to evolve their organisations more quickly and gain a competitive advantage,” said Lionel Grosclaude. “We are excited to add the ability to provide end-to-end proactive compliance to our growing portfolio of services and solutions that help our customers manage risks in their environment to ensure compliance.”
IPC’s new Compliance Policy Engine software platform is now available for the IPC Unigy platform, the company’s flagship unified communications and application platform. IPC Unigy is the world’s most widely adopted, secure, compliant end-to-end solution purpose-built to address the specific needs of the global regulated financial markets community.
(Source: IPC)
As the British Medical Association (BMA) and Royal College of Nursing (RCN) calls for an exemption from the Immigration Skills Charge for all health and social care staff, Helen Jackson, Managing Director for Bush & Company highlights for Lawyer Monthly the threats which are exacerbating the NHS’s skills shortage.
The Immigration Skills Charge (ISC) was one of the key reforms within the Immigration Act 2016, designed to reduce Britain’s reliance on migrant workers. Controversially, the charge will apply to medics working for the NHS and Health Education England, potentially diverting millions of pounds of funding away from frontline health services and the training of future health professionals.
Data from the BMA shows that £3.5 million would have been taken out of the NHS budget if the ISC had been applied to the doctors recruited between August 2014 to August 2015. Health Education England, the sponsor for all doctors in training in England, would have had to pay £1.6 million to cover sponsorship costs for their trainees for 2015-2016.
Whilst nursing has already been granted an exemption and remains on the shortage occupation list (SOL), the cost of recruiting other essential medical professionals from overseas will have an impact on frontline services, affecting nursing budgets, reducing staffing levels and training. Without an exemption, millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money intended for the NHS will in fact be redirected to support broad skills training initiatives that support a wide range of businesses across the UK.
It’s yet another pressure on a public service facing a severe skills shortage.
The NHS currently has four pools for recruitment, British trainees, existing NHS staff, EU Nationals and professionals from outside the EEA. All these pools are shrinking.
Without an exemption, the ISC will reduce the number of medical and healthcare professionals recruited from outside the EEA. With Article 50 triggering the Brexit process on 29 April, there could be further drops in applications from EU nationals. Staff already working for the NHS are being driven out by increasing work pressures, while many of the 57,000 staff from other European nations who are working here, are considering leaving due to the government’s reluctance to provide them with any security about their future. Finally, there are fewer nursing trainees, following the government’s decision to charge tuition fees to nursing students and axe the bursaries that used to help them cover their living costs. The talent pool is being drained from all sides.
There’s no shortage of statistics. One in ten nursing posts is unfilled. A survey by Nursing Standard last week revealed that more than half of nurses (52%) are considering quitting the NHS citing work pressures, and one in three nurses is due to retire in the next 10 years according to the RCN. Freedom of information responses showed that only 96 nurses joined the NHS from other European nations in December 2016 – a drop from 1,304 in July, while the number of EU nationals leaving the NHS rose by 68% from 1600 in 2014 to 2700 in 2016.
It’s clear that the NHS is simply not ready to rely on home-grown talent alone. At Bush & Company we employ highly trained health professionals to deliver high quality case management and expert witness services so we value the excellence of the training and their diverse experience. It is these skills and experiences of highly complex catastrophic injury cases which our consultants have gained through their work for the NHS, that our legal clients rely upon in the most important, demanding and emotive of cases.
We not only understand the importance of these skills, but also recognise and appreciate the lengthy training involved. It is a career that involves continuous learning and can include many specialities. It’s because of this lengthy training pipeline that the NHS could continue to be reliant on clinicians and nurses from overseas for quite a few years to come.
While the ICS alone may not be the straw that breaks the back of the NHS, we hope it does not prove to be a short-sighted policy that places an unsustainable burden on a cherished institution.
The way talent is hired is always changing, and now the talent is using the gig economy and its dynamic functionality to negotiate the way they work and who hires them. Geoff Smith, Managing Director of Experis UK & Ireland, explains to Lawyer Monthly what financial services organisations can do to solve their IT skills gaps.
Financial services organisations are experiencing a wave of disruption unlike any other in their history. Whether it be the insatiable consumer drive for the adoption of digital services, like mobile banking and biometric security, the emergence of smaller niche fintech players like Monzo and Atom Bank, who are quicker to adapt to new demands, or the ever-present threat of cyber-attacks that dominate international headlines; financial services organisations need to ensure they can attract and retain the best IT talent in order to respond to these changing market conditions.
But much of this talent is operating in a new way, keen to adopt more flexible working practices. The finite pool of talent has realised that they can capitalise on the supply/demand imbalance and as a result, some have started to favour more lucrative contractor roles over permanent positions. So, what are these new flexible working practices? Are they here to stay, and how can financial services businesses respond to ensure that they can secure the vital technology talent when they need to?
The rise of the gig economy
The gig economy – a growing market of short-term contractors and freelancers – has enabled technology professionals to operate on a flexible basis, rather than committing to conventional long term contracts. Even permanent employees are changing in their approach to tenure – it’s now not at all unusual for a young professional to change employer every couple of years. Recent research from ManpowerGroup revealed that two-thirds of millennials believe the “right” amount of time to stay in a single role before being promoted or moving to another is less than two years, with a quarter saying it is less than 12 months – confirming their appetite for new challenges and portfolio-style jobs.
While previous generations may have had a career for life and received a generous retirement package at the end of their tenure, the technology talent of today will likely be employed by several firms over the course of their working life (not least as the age of retirement continues to rise). As this new dynamic is becoming more prevalent, financial services organisations are turning to contractors to solve their growing technology needs and plug the skills gap.
Contractor numbers set to decrease?
This being said, upcoming changes in legislation could have an impact on the number of individuals in contractor positions. IR35 – set to be amended from this April – is a tax legislation that has been tightened up by the HMRC in a bid to crack down on tax avoidance. The legislation specifically targets those in the contractor market, and as a result, could mean businesses have access to a shrinking pool of temporary talent. On top of this, former contractors looking for permanent positions are likely to want to retain much of the flexibility they enjoyed when working in the gig economy, and organisations will have to respond to this if they are to attract and retain top resource
The future workforce landscape is difficult to predict, but what is for sure, is that it has shifted significantly in recent years and is set to continue to evolve. Businesses must ensure that they are able to adapt to this, if they are going to secure the technology resources they need now and in the future. There are huge benefits to both permanent and contractor IT talent: the former can develop highly specialised expertise in areas that are critical to specific business requirements, while the latter will often bring fresh ideas to the table and a broader knowledge base. Businesses will need to ensure that they have a balanced IT workforce that draws on both strands to succeed in this volatile landscape.
What companies need to do
In the battle to attract in-demand top technology talent through their doors, financial services companies need to ensure that they can adapt to the shifting workforce market and the rise of the gig economy. Part of this requires knowledge of what contractors and permanent workers are looking for, but it also comes down to planning ahead.
In this era of disruption, freelance support and specialist skills can often help financial services organisations deliver successful projects to meet changing consumer demands at very short notice. But, it is important not to neglect the permanent bed rock of your team as well. By partnering with a workforce provider, financial service organisations can navigate and plan for the resource they will need; in the immediate- medium- and long-term.
Parent barristers, especially women, will be disadvantaged by HMCTS proposals for Courts to start earlier and finish later, the Bar Council has said adding that the plans do not take account of rules that self-employed barristers must follow when organising their work.
A new pilot scheme will introduce extra sittings at Civil, Crown and Magistrates’ Courts to increase the number of cases they see each day with the Crown Court sitting until 18.00, Civil Courts until 19.00 and Magistrates until 20.30.
Chairman of the Bar Andrew Langdon QC said: “These arrangements will make it almost impossible for parents with childcare responsibilities to predict if they can make the school run or to know when they will be able to pick children up from the child-minders. The biggest impact will be on women.”
“Childcare responsibilities still fall disproportionately to women, many of whom do not return to the profession after having children. It is hard to see how these plans sit with the Government’s commitment to improving diversity in the profession and the judiciary.
“The profession and the judiciary must reflect the communities they serve. We need measures that will help women stay in the profession, rather than make it even more difficult to be a mother and a barrister at the same time.”
HMCTS have said that increasing the number of court sittings will not automatically require barristers to spend more time in court, but there is no mechanism in the plans to prevent a barrister being listed in both or all three sessions on the same day, finishing as late as 20.30.
Under the Cab-Rank rule, barristers must accept any appropriate instructions, but they will not know until a case is listed whether it will be an early start or a late finish, and they cannot withdraw from a case on the grounds that it clashes with childcare arrangements.
The Bar Council urges HMCTS to ensure that the impact on parents, and women in particular, is built into the evaluation criteria used to test the success of the pilots.
(Source: Bar Council)
Kahn Swick & Foti, LLC and KSF partner, the former Attorney General of Louisiana, Charles C. Foti, Jr., recently reminded investors that they have until May 1st 2017 to file lead plaintiff applications in a securities class action lawsuit against Netflix, Inc., if they purchased the Company's securities between July 22nd 2014 and October 15th 2014, inclusive (the "Class Period"). The action is pending in United States District Court for the Northern District of California.
Netflix and certain of its executives are charged with failing to disclose material information during the Class Period, violating federal securities laws.
In May 2014, Netflix made a price increase for monthly streaming subscriptions. On July 21st 2014, Netflix representatives told the market that the price increase had a "minimal" and "nominal" impact on subscriber growth, further stating that any adverse effect on revenue was "background noise" which had "no noticeable effect in the business."
Then, on October 15th 2014, Netflix revealed that the impact on earnings was hugely negative, including that the subscriber growth numbers were so low that Netflix slashed its projected earnings by almost fifty percent.
On this news, the price of Netflix's shares plummeted. This is not the first time Netflix has been sued, but the first class action. The media streaming giant was also sued a huge $1.5 billion last year in a dispute over breach of contract and libel by Relativity Media. Netflix, among others, has also been sued for its download content feature, by Blackbird Technologies, a patent trolling/squatting firm, over the patent governing downloadable video content.
If you purchased securities of Netflix and would like to discuss your legal rights and how this case might affect you and your right to recover for your economic loss, you may, without obligation or cost to you, call toll-free at 1-877-515-1850 or email KSF Managing Partner Lewis Kahn (lewis.kahn@ksfcounsel.com). If you wish to serve as a lead plaintiff in this class action, you must petition the Court by May 1st 2017.
(Source: Kahn Swick & Foti, LLC)
The Bar Council has responded to the Justice Select Committee Brexit report published last week. The report reflects many of the issues raised by the Bar Council both in evidence to the Committee and in The Brexit Papers: Second Edition.
A spokespersons said: “The Justice Committee have reached some sensible conclusions in their report. Effective cross-border arrangements to ensure continued co-operation with the EU on criminal justice need to be maintained. Likewise in civil justice, choice of jurisdiction together with mutual recognition and enforcement of judgments (as well as equivalent arrangements in family law) are in the UK’s interest as well as in the EU’s interest post-Brexit. They are recommendations for which the Bar Council, the Family Law Bar Association, and the Criminal Bar Association have been arguing.
“The Justice Committee recognise that the annual contribution of the UK legal services sector of £25.7 billion to UK GDP is valuable and is valued by small businesses and large corporations as well as by individuals. The importance of the City of London as a leading global centre of international dispute resolution is also key to the continued success of the financial and many other service sectors. The contribution of legal services to the UK’s future prosperity needs to recognised and protected during the coming negotiations with the EU.
“The report recognises that the inevitable period of uncertainty during the Brexit negotiations could damage the UK legal services sector, especially in the commercial field. The Bar Council welcomes the Committee’s call on the Government to provide more information to reduce the level of uncertainty in the sector without compromising the UK’s negotiating position.
“We also support Justice Committee’s conclusion that the Government should ensure, as a matter of priority, that transitional arrangements are agreed for criminal, civil and family law co-operation with the EU, to come into effect when Brexit occurs.
“We look forward to the Government’s response to the Justice Committee’s report.”
(Source: Bar Council)
