Digital Transformation in France: Legal Innovations

Abstract

In the article legislative regulation of the digitalization process in France as well as therelevant legal doctrine are analyzed. A research objective is a determination of the maincharacteristics of this process so as to compare with similar processes in the RussianFederation that the author does by means of general legal and comparative legal methods.The present period of the digital technologies application in France is connected with theplatform economy and uberisation having an impact on a legal status of citizens and theirrelationship with administration. Active development of the modern legislation devotedto the digital state is connected, firstly, with settlement of a movement of data. Theprinciple of openness by default mentioning the public data (data created by authorities)and general interest data (data on administrative contracts, subventions) is established.Authorities are obliged to publish these data online in the open data format. Secondly, thedigital State takes care of regulation of the human rights protection in digital society; it isbased on the principle of the Internet neutrality. Strengthening of consumer protectionis promoted by data portability and platform loyalty which suppliers of Internet servicesare obliged to provide. As the European General Data Protection Regulation 2016/679was adopted, it is implemented in the French legislation by means of a big number ofthe norms including specifying procedures of protection of the personal data rightsowners. Thirdly, access to digital technologies is differentiated. The French legislationwas enriched with the right to the Internet, but also provided this right with obligationsof the State, having introduced the state financial aid concerning payment of Internetservices costs by analogy with utility costs. The main conclusion of the conductedresearch consists in complexity of the legislation reforming for rapid implementation ofdigital technologies to the most different spheres of life. At the same time France is closelyinvolved in the common European process and aimed on the international cooperationin this sphere. Among comparative legal key reference points are useful to Russia, forexample, is one concerning personal data protection. With that the research showed thatthere are spheres in which Russia is quite well developing (for example, digitalisation ofpublic services).