August

District attorners in San Francisco and Los Angeles say several drivers have criminal histories which were not picked up by Uber's criminal record checks. Uber unwittingly hired sex offenders, identity thieves, burglars, a kidnapper and a convicted murderer, California prosecutors said, even when they had undergone checks. The case surrounds Uber drivers in the US, differing from that used in the UK, which uses local authority licensing and enhanced DBS checks.

Marijuana is, by far, the most commonly used illicit drug in the world. According to the World Drug Report, in 2013 there were 180.6 million marijuana users worldwide. The aggressive movement in the United States to legalize pot has not only resulted in the dramatic increase of people using marijuana and testing positive in workplace drug tests, but it has created confusion and concern among employers. Companies still have an obligation to ensure their workplaces are safe, secure and profitable, yet employees under the influence of pot are less safe and less productive than their non-using co-workers, which places people at risk and exposes employers to potentially expensive legal liability. Employers worldwide have a vested interest in understanding the legal status of marijuana in the country where they conduct business.

The privacy landscape in Africa and the Middle East, which has already changed remarkably in the past few years alone, may be on the verge of another transformation after the adoption in June 2014 of the African Union (AU) Convention on cybersecurity and data protection. The number of countries in the region may multiply far beyond the 18 countries that already have comprehensive privacy laws regulating the collection and use of personal information by the private sector. Now with the adoption of the AU Convention, which still must be ratified by 15 of the 54 member states, more countries in Africa may adopt laws to implement the AU Convention 's comprehensive (and European Union-like) privacy framework. Many of the existing regimes in the region are still in their formative stages, in large part because the regulators are not yet in place, however, in some of the countries with the more established privacy regimes, the regulators have been stepping up their enforcement efforts.