RoboPrivacy and the Law as “Meta-Technology”

The paper examines how a particular class of robotic applications, i.e. service robots, or consumer robots, may affect current legal frameworks of privacy and data protection. More particularly, the focus is on (i) a new expectation of privacy brought about by these robotic applications; (ii) the realignment of the traditional distinction between data processors and data controllers; and, (iii) a novel set of challenges to the principle of privacy by design. Instead of a one-way movement of social evolution from technology to law, however, a key component of the analysis concerns the aim of the law to govern technological innovation as well as human and artificial behaviour through the regulatory tools of technology. Since most domestic and service robots are not a sort of “out-of-the-box” machine and moreover, their behaviour and decisions can be unpredictable and risky, special attention is drawn to the experiment of the Japanese government that has worked out a way to address (some of) the legal issues, which are at stake in this paper, through the creation of special zones for robotics empirical testing and development, namely a form of living lab, or Tokku. Interestingly, some EU member states have already followed suit.