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30 January 2024
Issue: 8057 / Categories: Legal News , Profession , Regulatory
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Axiom Ince regulatory intervention review

The Legal Services Board (LSB) is partnering with Belfast law firm Carson McDowell to review the regulatory intervention into Axiom Ince

LSB general counsel Danielle Viall set out the scope of the review in a letter last week to the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA).

It will consider steps or action taken, or not, by the SRA in the period before intervention, the adequacy of the SRA’s supervision, the SRA’s policies and procedures regarding ‘accumulator firms’, the manner in which the SRA determines high-risk firms and transactions, and its oversight of higher-risk firms and transactions.

Viall said she anticipated a ‘rapid review’ with the report published in spring 2024.

The SRA closed the firm in October after suspending three directors in August 2023 amid reports £60m was missing from client accounts.

Issue: 8057 / Categories: Legal News , Profession , Regulatory
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MOVERS & SHAKERS

Cripps—Radius Law

Cripps—Radius Law

Commercial and technology practice boosted by team hire

Switalskis—Grimsby

Switalskis—Grimsby

Firm expands with new Grimsby office to serve North East Lincolnshire

Slater Heelis—Will Newman & Lucy Spilsbury

Slater Heelis—Will Newman & Lucy Spilsbury

Property team boosted by two solicitor appointments

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Fresh proposals to criminalise ‘nudification’ apps, prioritise cyberflashing and non-consensual intimate images, and even ban under-16s from social media have reignited debate over whether the Online Safety Act 2023 (OSA 2023) is fit for purpose. Writing in NLJ this week, Alexander Brown, head of technology, media and telecommunications, and Alexandra Webster, managing associate, Simmons & Simmons, caution against reactive law-making that could undermine the Act’s ‘risk-based and outcomes-focused’ design
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