Hacking the law system: open legal data in Europe What can opening access to law achieve? The answer is simple, it can result in a better and wider legal knowledge, which means a “better informed citizenry”. Openlaws.eu is a DG Justice project intended to give citizens better access to legislation, case law and commentary in the UK, Netherlands and Austria. Professor Chris Marsden will discuss the benefits that might come out of a wider legal knowledge, including: more litigation, more mediation, better consumer contracts, lower contract costs, better spread of liabilities, better protection for those whose rights are abused.

1. #Hackingthelaw
OpenLaws.eu
Prof. Chris Marsden
#ODIFridays
20 March 2015

2. Law is difficult and boring –
we have better things to do

3. But law matters – to all of us

6. We can open access to law

7. Openlaws.eu DG Just project
 UK, Netherlands and Austria
 top 3 EU: OKFN legislation rankings
 open access to law in Europe
 legislation, case law and commentary
 Not just legislation.gov.uk
 social network for lawyers, students and
interested citizens.

8. What can opening access to
law achieve?
 better and wider legal knowledge,
 which means a “better informed citizenry”
1. on the legal community,
2. in combination with open data
entrepreneurs.

9. 1. Citizens understand their rights
 How to secure those rights, and costs of
access to justice.
 Helps identify better the manner in which the
law is applied in courts,
 feedback loop can help us understand how
to draft and enforce laws more effectively
 better litigation,
 more mediation,
 better consumer contracts,
 lower contract costs,
 better spread of liabilities,
 better protection for those whose rights are
abused.

10. 2. Open access to law alongside
other open databases.
 If we find out that
 people are not using the law effectively
to enforce their rights and seek justice,
 that can help us identify parts of our social
and economic environment
 where we might have put rights and
responsibilities in the wrong place.

11. Example: if no-one is found effectively
liable for computer security breaches
due to defective products
 we might explore the insurance and criminal
law implications for cybercrime
 also computers owners & software authors
 Designing new protocols, practices, laws?
 Might result in more trusted online environment
 That’s one small example.

12. Openlaws release our first
code today: March 20 at a
hackathon in Salzburg
We have completed our
UK, EU and Netherlands
case studies

13. Expanding open innovation to law
Introducing mass-customization to law
Proposing a comprehensive European
“Big Open Legal Data” (BOLD) Vision 2020
 for incremental implementation,
 built on top of existing EU and national systems and content
 (e.g. EUR-Lex, e-Justice System, e-Codex).
Chris Marsden (Sussex)
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14. Developing BOLD ICT Platform
Promote
open data,
open access publications, and
open standards
Chris Marsden (Sussex)
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15. Developing big online legal data
Free Access to Law movement (FALM)
 online case law via BAILII in the UK
 Legal Information Institutes (AustLII, Cornell etc.)
#GoodLaw online statutes
 expanded rapidly, crowdsourcing ideas for #goodlaw
Online legal education and research
 BILETA since 1985
 Electronic Law Journals project at Warwick
 EJLT – now Script-ed + IJoC at USC many US law journals
 Journal of Open Access to Law (JOAL) est. 2014!
 publishing books via Creative Commons: Marsden 2010Chris Marsden (Sussex)
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16. Ministry of Justice ready for
(r)evolution?
#Goodlaw
 radical crowd-sourced legislative approach
Open Data
 Very fashionable amongst G7 countries etc.
 Implementation more patchy than general
 UK: BAILII, ICLR, Supreme Court reforms;
 But we really need a pan-European
approach
Chris Marsden (Sussex)
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17. Why not build a
smartphone app for lawyers?
 Already done using
open case law, statute,
articles
 Where? Austria RIS:App
 Why not here? Why not
everywhere?
Chris Marsden (Sussex)
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18. Team – note Andres Guadamuz
CC licence expertInstitution Name
U.Amsterdam Prof. Radboud G.F. Winkels
Prof. Mireille van Eechoud LAPSI2.0
Sussex Prof. Chris Marsden
Dr Andres Guadamuz CC4.0
London School of
Economics
Dr. Paolo Dini
Dr. Shenja van der Graaf BXL
Dr. Antonella Passani ROMA
ALPENITE -
developers
Giulio Marcon
Gianluigi Alberici
SUAS Prof. Thomas Heistracher
DI (FH) Thomas Lampoltshammer
BYWASS Dr. Clemens Wass, MBL, MBA
Chris Marsden (Sussex)
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19. c.marsden
@sussex.ac.uk
@openlaws
@ChrisTMarsden
openlaws.eu