CyJurII CyJurII
Cyber Jurisprudence International Initiative
A weekly initiative of CyJurII

Expert Q&A Series
Weekly Insights by Justyna Sarkowicz

A recurring space for discussion, knowledge exchange, and deeper understanding of the evolving challenges at the intersection of technology and law.

Justyna Sarkowicz Justyna Sarkowicz — CyJurII Theorist: Cyber Law, Digital Evidence & Criminal Justice A legal researcher and expert specialising in cyber law, digital evidence, and the digitalisation of criminal justice. Her work focuses on international and European legal frameworks addressing emerging technological challenges in criminal proceedings, including cybercrime investigations, admissibility of electronic evidence, and the use of new technologies in criminal justice. Areas of expertise: • Digital Evidence and Admissibility in Criminal Proceedings • Cybercrime and International Criminal Cooperation • Criminal Justice in the Digital Era • Artificial Intelligence and Emerging Technologies in Criminal Law · Email: sarkowicz.justyna@gmail.com. answers a new question every Friday
Submit a Question Read Past Editions
How it works

One question, answered every week

Each edition moves through a fixed rhythm — from open submissions to a published answer to community discussion. Here's where the week stands.

VII
Days a Week
Mon–Thu

Questions open

The CyJurII community submits questions through the dedicated Q&A platform below.

Friday

The answer is published

A selected question is answered in that week's edition of the Expert Q&A Series by Justyna Sarkowicz.

Weekend

The conversation spreads

The edition is shared across CyJurII channels, including social media and the CyJurII website, inviting discussion and new questions for next week.

Suggested topics

What to ask about

Questions on any area of cyber law are welcome — these themes are a starting point, not a limit.

01

Digital evidence and its role in modern criminal proceedings

02

Cybercrime and cross-border investigations

03

International cyber law and regulatory developments

04

Artificial intelligence and emerging legal challenges

05

Digitalisation of justice systems

06

Future perspectives of cyber jurisprudence

Submit your question

Take part in the conversation

Submissions are reviewed each week. Selected questions are answered on Friday and credited by first name unless you ask to remain anonymous.

By submitting, you agree that CyJurII may publish your question and Justyna Sarkowicz's answer as part of the weekly series.

Thank you — your question has been received for this week's round.
Something went wrong sending your question. Please try again, or email contact@cyjurii.org directly.
Past editions

Weekly Insights archive

Every published edition, in order. New editions are added each Friday.

Edition 02 · Date, 21 August 2026

Does the Digital Age Require a Redefinition of Human Rights?

Contemporary discussions about the evolution of human rights in the age of the internet and emerging technologies need not focus on creating an entirely new catalogue of digital rights. In my view, the key challenge is to reconsider how existing legal concepts are understood and applied. Traditional safeguards must be adapted to a new reality in which technological progress has fundamentally altered the balance of power, particularly by reshaping the relationship between individuals, states, and powerful private actors. In the data-driven economy, the traditional understanding of the right to privacy is increasingly insufficient. Historically, privacy was largely understood in terms of protecting the home, correspondence, and the private sphere from unwanted interference. Today, effective privacy protection must also encompass meaningful control over personal information and the ways in which it is collected, combined, profiled, and processed at scale. Freedom of expression is undergoing a similar transformation. Its exercise increasingly takes place within privately operated digital environments, where algorithms influence which information is amplified, recommended, or made less visible. Through often opaque systems of content moderation, ranking, and promotion, digital platforms can therefore have a significant impact on the conditions under which public discourse takes place. Perhaps the most fundamental challenge, however, concerns human autonomy. Artificial intelligence systems are increasingly capable of analysing behaviour, generating risk profiles, predicting preferences, and influencing individual choices. Under these conditions, the boundary between technological assistance and unacceptable interference with individual autonomy becomes increasingly difficult to define. This issue is particularly significant in the justice system, where the use of algorithmic tools may directly affect due process, judicial decision-making, and the position of the individual before the law. Consequently, I believe the focus of the academic debate should shift. Rather than asking only whether we need new rights, we should also ask whether existing human rights remain genuinely effective in the digital environment. The future of human rights protection will not depend solely on adopting new declarations or creating new legal categories. It will depend on ensuring that existing rights remain enforceable in practice. There is a real risk that rights may retain their formal validity while gradually losing their practical significance. The digital age therefore may not require a revolution in human rights law. It requires something more fundamental: a renewed understanding of how existing rights must be interpreted and protected in an environment increasingly shaped by automated decision-making and complex technological systems. Ultimately, the central question is not simply what new rights we should create, but whether we can preserve meaningful human agency in a world where technology increasingly shapes the decisions that affect us.

Edition 01 · Date, 16 August 2026

In your view, what is currently the biggest legal challenge posed by AI-generated evidence in criminal proceedings?

[In my opinion, one of the greatest challenges associated with evidence generated or modified by AI in criminal proceedings is determining its origin, integrity, and credibility, and the ability to reliably verify it. The problem, however, is not limited to deepfakes. AI can create new materials, but it can also modify authentic images, recordings, documents, or other digital data. Therefore, determining where the material originated, how it was obtained, whether it was modified, and what happened to it during subsequent stages of processing becomes crucial. In this context, provenance and chain of custody become particularly important. At the same time, authenticity is not the same as credibility. Confirming the source or integrity of the material does not necessarily mean that its content accurately reflects reality or that it has been correctly interpreted. Therefore, assessing AI-enabled evidence should go beyond the mere question of whether AI was involved in its creation or processing. We should therefore neither automatically trust AI-enabled materials nor reject them on this basis. We need clear, technologically neutral, and practically applicable standards of evaluation that will allow courts to assess the origin, integrity, processing, and credibility of specific evidence. In my opinion, the most important question today is not: "Did AI contribute to the creation of this evidence?" but: "Can we verify its history and properly assess its probative value?" This is particularly important because AI poses two opposing threats: the acceptance of manipulated evidence as authentic and the wrongful denial of authentic evidence as allegedly generated or manipulated by AI.