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A good portion of interested participants, cherry-picked speakers, and two pinches of networking – that's all you need for the perfect online event. The right software also determines its success. In 2020, we as the eco Association digitalised around 100 events with a wide variety of online tools. Christiane Skiba, eco Branch Manager in Cologne and Head of Marketing, takes stock and gives valuable tips for the coming year.

The year 2021 offers an opportunity for a strategic reorientation of German and European digital policy. Oliver Süme, Chair of the eco Association, calls for a more sustainable digital policy that sees digitalisation as part of the solution to many global challenges and uses existing innovation potential more consistently than before.

We should not sit back and relax. When eco, 25 years after its foundation, chose “Internet with responsibility” as our motto, we did not do so lightly. We are aware of the scope of our responsibility – and we believe in making a difference. We know that digital infrastructure is often critical infrastructure and that critical infrastructure is always a potential target for attack. If, in the middle of the pandemic, the IT systems of a major hospital were to be paralyzed by a (possibly even wrongly addressed) hacker attack, the damage will affect human lives.

With the drafts for an IT Security Act 2.0, the new Telecommunications Act, and the BND Act, all of which were hastily approved by the German Federal Cabinet yesterday, the German federal government is fundamentally undermining general IT security and damaging the trustworthiness of digital communication in Germany.

The German Telecommunications Act is to be fundamentally reformed within this legislative term and an updated version of a joint draft act has just been published. eco denounces the overall chaotic legislative process which is occurring at the expense of content-related diligence and appropriate consultation with associations. In particular, eco criticises the fact that the amended act will create a new class of protection that will essentially place service providers under an increased level of risk.

The German Chancellery has presented a draft of what is termed as the BND Act. According to the draft, the German Federal Intelligence Service (BND) is to be given permission to hack providers abroad in order to obtain inventory, traffic and content data. eco – Association of the Internet Industry sharply criticises this initiative and has delivered a statement on the draft act.

On 26th November, for the 19th time, eco – Association of the Internet Industry presented the eco://awards, one of the most prestigious awards in the Internet industry.

The Covid-19 pandemic is serving as a digital accelerator. This is having a particularly profound impact on our working world, says Lucia Falkenberg, Head of the New Work Competence Group and CPO at eco – Association of the Internet Industry. She expects the next evolutionary stage of the working world to come through artificial intelligence (AI).

eco – Association of the Internet Industry is part of the newly elected board of EuroISPA, the largest umbrella organisation of European Internet service providers. Thomas Bihlmayer, Policy Adviser at eco, will assume the role of treasurer for the association.

From 1 January 2021 onwards, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (“the UK”) will no longer be party to the European Union legislation, rules and agreements (aka “Brexit”).  We asked Eva Kasprowicz, an IT and Privacy lawyer at Fieldfisher (Germany) LLP, about the potential impacts from an EU privacy perspective and how affected businesses should prepare for it.