Ruhi Kanakia

Student Assistant with the Innovation, Strategy & Policy team at Leiden Learning and Innovation Centre. The team is currently part of the consortium for the XR4Human international project, funded by the European Union, and is working towards developing regulatory strategies for the ethical and legal use of XR technologies in the EU. As part of the team, I have contributed to the EU-funded XR4Human Consortium, supporting interdisciplinary research on the regulation of XR technologies in the EU. I have also engaged in conducting a comprehensive regulatory gap analysis, identifying key legal and ethical challenges of XR technologies, and drafted a detailed policy recommendations for future EU legislation on the subject.

At CMS-IndusLaw, I was part of the Technology, Media, and Telecommunications practice group, based out of Mumbai. My role included, inter alia: - Advising domestic and international tech, media, fintech, and online gaming clients on technology law, digital law, and regulatory compliance, including GDPR, data protection, and consumer protection regulations. - Conducting risk assessments, privacy audits and due diligence for new features on our client's platforms and suggesting creative measures to make it more compliant. -Regularly engaging with regulators and authorities through active policy advocacy, to help shape India’s data protection, online gaming, fintech, and digital law landscape in line with our client's interests. - Helping organizations align their privacy policies and practices with data protection laws like the GDPR, and drafting advocacy letters to government bodies to shape India's data protection regime. - Providing KYC/AML advisory, privacy compliance guidance, and regulatory risk assessments for innovative digital platforms. - Drafting, reviewing, and negotiating SaaS, marketing, vendor, TTP and other tech contracts, licensing agreements, and privacy policies to ensure legal and operational compliance. - Assessing intermediary liability and platform compliance under Indian law and the DSA. - Performing compliance audits of advertising, onboarding, and operational processes to mitigate legal risks. - Guiding clients on emerging technology regulations and advised on cross-border product launch strategies, ensuring adherence to GDPR and other global digital standards. - Assisting in the establishment of innovative platforms by navigating complex regulatory landscapes and facilitating their market entry.

Technology, Media and Telecommunications Team Primarily assisted in research work related to data privacy and the telecom industry. This included research on the new Standard Contractual Clauses released by the European Commission to understand their effect on the risk assessment of data transfers from the European Economic Area to third countries. Research on whether ‘remote access’ constitutes a data transfer under the Schrems-II judgement by the Court of Justice of the European Union. Research on the implications when an application to register a trademark assignment has been filed, but has not confirmed by the Trademark Registry. Research on the 'equal share of royalty' as under the Copyright Act as well as research on case laws referencing surveillance to be in accordance with procedure established by law.

Vetted the website Privacy Policy and Terms of Use for a client. Prepared an article highlighting the compliance for businesses in consonance with the Personal Data Protection Bill, 2019. Conducted research on the legal and compliance considerations of the iSAFE instrument introduced by 100X VC.

In this tech-based legal startup, interns are focused on reviewing and checking bulk-uploaded contracts and writing Blogs/ articles for the firm.

Primarily assigned the writing of articles, and research, focused upon topics related to Cyber Laws, Cyber Crimes, Internet Rights, Internet Governance, and Privacy.