On November 5, 2019, a round table was held at the Moscow Chamber of Commerce and Industry on the topic: “Electronic Commerce. Smart contracts. New Opportunities of the Digital Economy ”, which discussed the main problems of legal support of electronic commerce.
At the event, the main trends of the digital economy were presented and the state of legal regulation of this sphere was outlined. According to Suren Vardanyan, Vice President of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry, opening the meeting, the Chamber pays special attention to digitalization issues: digital products are being developed that allow entrepreneurs to receive new services, and the Chamber follows the main economic trends. “We try at all the events that take place within the walls of the MCCI to develop specific proposals, which we then pass on to the authorities and all interested departments,” Vardanyan emphasized.
According to Igor Sudets, Deputy Director of the Digital State Development Department of the Ministry of Digital Development, Telecommunications and Mass Media of the Russian Federation, 17 draft laws are currently being drafted to regulate the main directions of digitalization of the Russian economy. In the near future it is expected that the Government will give instructions on the preparation of about 60 more draft laws. For example, the draft law on digital financial assets has already undergone seven editions, but has not yet been submitted to the State Duma. Now the eighth version of the document is being prepared. The total budget allocation for federal projects related to the implementation of digital technologies is 1634.9 billion rubles. The main national programs being implemented now, according to Igor Sudets, are a training program for the digital economy; digital infrastructure creation; digital technology development; digital security; development of legal regulation and the creation of digital state regulation. As for the latter, as stated by the representative of the Ministry of Communications, the basic principle of digital government is “a person does not need to know which authority he interacts with. He sends a request, and the state executes it. " Moreover, according to the expert, “the state itself should come to us”: after some time, every citizen can receive push notifications about what actions he needs to take: pay taxes, replace a driver’s license, etc.
Artem Dalevich, Vice President of the ICIE, spoke about the implementation of the secure transaction mechanism using escrow accounts on the Business Market platform, developed and implemented by the MCCI
Since lawyers made up a large share of the roundtable audience, one of the main topics of discussion was the legal regulation of electronic commerce. Senior Associate at Rödl & Partner Alexandra Nechaeva spoke about the main risks that accompany the conclusion of contracts in online trading. It was, in particular, about the interpretation of the concept of an offer and the moment of its receipt, as well as about the differences between online and distance trading. The speaker emphasized that there is no definition of electronic commerce in the legislative field, which leads to a rather arbitrary interpretation of the electronic commerce process in judicial practice. In addition, Alexandra Nechaeva said that Russia has not developed approaches to determining the jurisdiction of transactions involving foreign elements. Summing up her speech, the speaker noted that “the problems of determining jurisdiction are now one of the first in matters of the digital economy”.
Svetlana Mochalina, head of the risk management department at L'Occitane, spoke about the legal risks of an international company in the retail industry in Russia. A franchise firm defended its interests by registering trademark rights. This almost completely prevented parallel sales.
The topic of the speech of DDC Ltd Director Ilya Mikheev was smart contracts. Since this is a very promising form of digital agreements, the message caused serious interest from the audience. According to the expert, for the first time a smart contract appeared a long time ago - in 1996. “In principle, a smart contract is a computer code that guarantees the fulfillment of obligations subject to all agreed conditions,” the speaker explained. Another important distinguishing feature of a smart contract is that it must be hosted in a decentralized, trusted environment. Such an environment is guaranteed, in particular, by blockchain technology. Smart contracts are already used, for example, in diamond verification.
The representative of the company-operator of fiscal data OFD.ru Dmitry Pogozhev talked about the currently introduced product labeling system, its advantages and disadvantages.
Summing up the round table, the moderator of the meeting, forensic financial expert Natalya Manuylova noted that "the digital economy is not only cryptocurrency and blockchain." The main purpose of the event was to identify the risks that entrepreneurs face in introducing digital technologies, and to outline ways to minimize them, including using compliance procedures.
The Advisor to the President of the MCCI Marina Evteeva thanked all the speakers and participants for the informative conversation and assured that all the proposals that were voiced would be summarized and brought to the attention of the leadership of the chamber.
The event was supported by the Government of Moscow and the Department of Economic Policy and Development of Moscow...
