Digital Vulnerability for All

What if we took seriously the idea recently put forward by many institutions and scholars that, in online interactions, all human beings are vulnerable or made more vulnerable than ordinary? What if our regulatory infrastructures acknowledged that the vast majority of us, even in the hyperconnected societies of the Global North, have little understanding of the digital infrastructure on which we depend? This chapter aims to explore these questions and propose a new interpretive framework, using European private law as a testing ground at the crossroads of national and European Union rules. In particular, it investigates whether assuming that we are all vulnerable might reduce the protection for those who belong to protected categories and are at heightened risk of cumulative and intersectional discrimination. It tests whether embracing digital vulnerability as a universal condition would lead to an unacceptable level of personalization of the law and burden corporations and individuals with excessive vulnerability-related duties. The chapter also verifies whether and how vulnerability-related duties might be enforceable in the borderless digital environment. All of the above will hopefully help challenge current interpretive views that deny any relevance to online defenselessness.