Legal Studies in Digital Age

The expansion of service-sharing platforms, such as Snapp, Divar, and Aparat, has facilitated the emergence of novel forms of criminality whose attribution to digital intermediaries poses significant challenges from the perspective of traditional criminal law. This study aims to explain the scope, foundations, and conditions of platforms’ criminal liability for crimes committed by users under the Iranian legal system and to compare them with the corresponding framework in the legal system of England. This qualitative study employed a descriptive-analytical method with a comparative approach. Data were collected through library-based research, including Iranian statutory laws—the Computer Crimes Act of 2009 and the Electronic Commerce Act of 2003—English legislation, including the Communications Act 2003, the Digital Economy Act 2017, and the Online Safety Act 2023, as well as judicial decisions, scholarly articles, and reputable theses published during the past ten years. The data were analyzed using deductive reasoning and qualitative content analysis. The findings indicated that, despite the recognition of the criminal liability of legal persons under the Iranian Islamic Penal Code of 2013, Iranian law lacks a coherent framework governing the criminal liability of platforms. Consequently, courts are compelled to rely on general principles, such as the rule of causation and the theory of negligent supervision. By contrast, English law, through the enactment of the Online Safety Act 2023, has established a comprehensive system based on a “duty of care,” under which platforms are required to conduct regular risk assessments, prevent the dissemination of illegal content, and cooperate with the regulatory authority. Breach of these obligations may result in fines of up to £18 million or 10% of the platform’s worldwide revenue. This study concludes that the Iranian legal system could draw upon the English model while preserving its Islamic jurisprudential foundations, including the rule of causation and the principle of no harm, to establish a “tiered liability” system based on the number of users and the level of risk. It is recommended that the Computer Crimes Act be amended to expressly establish preventive obligations for platforms.

Abstract

Financial crimes in municipalities have become one of the most significant challenges facing urban management and local governance due to the substantial volume of financial resources, the complexity of administrative processes, weaknesses in oversight systems, and insufficient transparency. The development of digital technologies and smart urban management systems has created new opportunities to enhance transparency, accountability, and the prevention of administrative corruption. This study aims to design a comprehensive model for the situational prevention of financial crimes in municipalities, with emphasis on urban management capacities and modern supervisory technologies. The study was conducted using a descriptive-analytical method and a comparative examination of the legal systems of Iran, Spain, and the United States. Data were collected through library research, document analysis, and the examination of legal practices. The proposed model was designed on the basis of the institutional, legal, managerial, and technological capacities of municipalities. The findings indicate that inadequate access controls, a lack of transparency in financial processes, the concentration of authority without effective oversight, an inefficient performance evaluation system, and the limited use of smart supervisory systems are the most important situational factors facilitating financial crimes in municipalities. Accordingly, the proposed model was developed around three principal dimensions: “access control and segregation of duties,” “process transparency and public oversight,” and “the implementation of smart systems based on data analytics.” The results demonstrate that the simultaneous utilization of urban management capacities, online reporting systems, and artificial intelligence technologies can significantly enhance the effectiveness of situational strategies for preventing financial crimes.

Intergenerational justice, as a concept concerned with the rights and interests of future generations, emphasizes the necessity of responsible use of natural resources and environmental protection. This concept entered international environmental law through the Stockholm Conference of 1972 and, by 2024, had been developed in major instruments such as the Rio Declaration of 1992, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Kyoto Protocol, the Paris Agreement, and the Convention on Biological Diversity. Using a descriptive-analytical research method, this study examines how these instruments, through the establishment of state obligations, legal frameworks, and mechanisms of international cooperation, provide the basis for future generations’ access to minimum standards of living and sustainable natural resources. The findings indicate that the principle of intergenerational justice requires the obligations of international environmental law to regulate development and the exploitation of natural resources in such a way that the rights of future generations are protected and a balance of interests between generations is maintained. Through the creation of state obligations and mechanisms of international cooperation, these instruments have played a role in ensuring minimum environmental standards for future generations. The main contribution of this study is that, by providing a systematic analysis of the historical and legal trajectory of the requirements arising from international environmental instruments between 1972 and 2024, it enables a more precise evaluation of the extent to which these requirements have affected intergenerational justice and offers a theoretical foundation for developing and strengthening the status of this principle in international environmental law. However, practical and empirical evidence shows that, given the soft-law nature of international environmental law, it has not been able to adequately safeguard and protect the principle of intergenerational justice. Moreover, the adoption of a “Comprehensive Convention on Intergenerational Justice” and the international criminalization of “ecocide” in the Statute of the International Criminal Court, or the establishment of a specialized environmental court, are proposed as measures to strengthen the enforceability of this principle.

Venture capital, as a driving force of the knowledge-based economy, represents a financing model in which investors assume the substantial risks associated with early-stage startups in exchange for equity ownership and participation in corporate governance. Nevertheless, the effective implementation of venture capital investment agreements within the Iranian legal system faces fundamental legal challenges. The principal issue addressed in this study concerns the extent to which traditional legal rules and regulatory deficiencies undermine the effectiveness of contractual mechanisms such as preferred shares, veto rights, and exit mechanisms thereby increasing transaction costs and contributing to higher rates of contractual failure. This research adopts a descriptive-analytical methodology based on documentary analysis of Iranian statutory law, particularly the Commercial Code and the Civil Code, to examine the inconsistencies between modern venture capital agreements and the existing legislative framework. The identified research gap demonstrates that the Iranian legal literature has predominantly focused on the theoretical dimensions of venture capital agreements while paying insufficient attention to their practical enforceability and the challenges arising before domestic courts. The rationale for selecting this topic lies in the pressing need to enhance judicial certainty for investors and to prevent capital flight from the technology sector. The findings indicate that the absence of formal legal recognition for several key venture capital contractual mechanisms under Iranian commercial law, together with their potential conflict with mandatory legal rules, has significantly weakened the enforceability of venture capital agreements and diminished their effectiveness in dispute resolution. The study further demonstrates that the current legal framework lacks the flexibility required for efficient risk allocation and management within startup financing transactions. Accordingly, it recommends the enactment of a dedicated Venture Capital Act, the establishment of specialized technology arbitration institutions, and the adoption of standardized model agreements approved by competent regulatory authorities in order to enhance legal certainty and strengthen mutual confidence between investors and entrepreneurs.

Individual criminal responsibility, as one of the fundamental pillars of international criminal law, occupies a central position in the work of the International Criminal Court. This article aims to provide a practical and critical assessment of the Court’s jurisprudence in the field of individual criminal responsibility by examining the status of this concept within the Court’s criminal policy and the challenges confronting it. The study was conducted using an analytical-descriptive method and drawing on library sources, judicial decisions, and the official documents of the Court. The findings indicate that, through a systematic interpretation of Article 25 of the Rome Statute—particularly through the theory of “control over the crime” in the Lubanga case and the theory of “organizational control” in the Katanga case—the Court has been able to consolidate an advanced framework of individual criminal responsibility in customary international law. Nevertheless, the Court’s case law in landmark cases such as Ntaganda, Ongwen, and Gbagbo, while successful in prosecuting high-ranking leaders and developing concepts such as “intergenerational harm,” has faced significant challenges in proving group intent, distinguishing between the sharing of intent and knowledge of the group’s intent, protecting witnesses, and interacting with states. The non-cooperation of states in arresting fugitives, reflected in 31 unexecuted arrest warrants, dependence on voluntary contributions for the implementation of reparations, and political pressures are among the most important obstacles to the Court’s effectiveness. By proposing reforms at legislative, structural, procedural, and international-cooperation levels, the article emphasizes the need to amend Article 25 in order to clarify the criteria distinguishing direct perpetration from participation, to reform Regulation 55 to prevent changes in the form of responsibility at the final stages of proceedings, to establish a state-support fund with mandatory resources for the implementation of reparations, and to strengthen cooperation with regional organizations.

Social networks have become one of the most influential environments for the circulation, interpretation, and contestation of religious knowledge in contemporary societies. This article analyzes the role of social networks in disseminating Islamic religious knowledge and countering religious doubts, with attention to their communicative capacities, educational potential, ethical risks, and jurisprudential implications. The study adopts a descriptive-analytical approach and is based on library research, drawing on scholarly sources related to digital religion, social networking, religious identity, media communication, cyberspace ethics, and Islamic religious education. The analysis shows that social networks can significantly expand access to religious knowledge by enabling rapid communication, multimedia education, interactive learning, virtual religious communities, and direct engagement between religious scholars and public audiences. These platforms can support Qur’anic education, moral instruction, religious ceremonies, and practical responses to users’ questions, especially among youth and students who increasingly encounter religion through digital media. At the same time, the findings indicate that social networks may intensify religious doubts by spreading fragmented, emotional, decontextualized, or misleading content. The speed, anonymity, and participatory nature of these platforms can weaken the distinction between authentic religious knowledge and personal opinion, thereby affecting religious identity and public trust in religious authority. The article argues that countering religious doubts requires more than reactive correction or restriction. It requires systematic digital religious communication, credible scholarly presence, media literacy, ethical dialogue, audience-centered content, rapid response mechanisms, and connection between online religious activity and real religious institutions such as mosques and educational centers. The article concludes that social networks are neither inherently harmful nor automatically beneficial for religion. Their impact depends on how religious actors use them to combine authentic knowledge, moral responsibility, communicative skill, and strategic engagement in the digital age.

Adaptation to climate change, as a complementary strategy to the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, has largely been described in the literature of international environmental law as a soft and indeterminate obligation; an obligation that, in foundational instruments such as the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and even the Paris Agreement, has mostly remained within the framework of conditional and guiding language and lacks a clear legal enforcement mechanism. Adopting a descriptive-analytical approach, this article reconsiders the emerging concept of “smart adaptation” in light of the customary principles of international environmental law—particularly the precautionary principle, the principle of prevention, and the principle of environmental impact assessment—as well as the principles of environmental democracy. The findings of the study indicate that smart adaptation, as distinct from conventional adaptation and in contrast to the concept of maladaptation, is grounded in data-driven decision-making, predictability, principled flexibility, and participatory governance. By relying on a systematic cycle of planning, assessment, implementation, and monitoring, it can partially compensate for the gaps in the soft obligations contained in international instruments such as the Paris Agreement. The experience of the European Union in the document “Forging a Climate-Resilient Europe” (2021), which is structured around the three axes of smarter, more systemic, and faster adaptation, represents an example of the practical realization of this regulatory model. The article concludes that the principle of coordination and integration, the principle of continuous supervision and monitoring, and the principle of principled flexibility constitute the fundamental pillars of smart adaptation regulation, and that their realization, particularly in countries such as Iran, will face structural obstacles in the absence of binding national legal frameworks.

Cyberattacks against countries’ critical infrastructure have become one of the most significant challenges of international law over the past two decades. Using a descriptive-analytical method, this article examines the international responsibility of states for such attacks. The research findings indicate that, despite the consolidation of the general principles of responsibility in classical law, establishing responsibility in cyberspace faces two fundamental obstacles: first, the difficulty of proving the attribution of attacks to states due to the intangible and transboundary nature of cyberspace, the possibility of identity falsification, and the use of non-state actors by states; and second, the absence of clear and uniform standards regarding the level of evidence required to prove cyberattacks. State practice in the cases of Stuxnet and attacks on Ukraine’s infrastructure shows that states often refrain from accepting responsibility and resort to a strategy of denial. If responsibility is established, its legal consequences include cessation of the wrongful act, reparation for damage, and countermeasures, each of which faces practical implementation challenges. Finally, the article presents proposals for drafting a comprehensive international treaty, establishing an independent body for investigating cyberattacks, and developing evidentiary standards.