Computer Law Commons^™

Front Matter

SMU Science and Technology Law Review

No abstract provided.

Blocking Ad Blockers, 16 J. Marshall Rev. Intell. Prop. L. 272 (2017), Tyler Barbacovi

UIC Review of Intellectual Property Law

The prevalence of ad blocking software (software that prevents the loading of web based advertisements) is a growing problem for website owners and content creators who rely on advertising revenue to earn money. While the number of ad block users continues to increase, there has thus far been no significant legal challenge to ad blocking in the United States. This comment examines how a website owner, through a combination of technological improvements and the anti-circumvention provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, could successfully raise a legal challenge against the purveyors of ad blocking software.

The Privacy, Probability, And Political Pitfalls Of Universal Dna Collection, Meghan J. Ryan

SMU Science and Technology Law Review

Watson and Crick’s discovery of the structure of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) in 1953 launched a truth-finding mission not only in science but also in the law. Just thirty years later–after the science had evolved–DNA evidence was being introduced in criminal courts. Today, DNA evidence is heavily relied on in criminal and related cases. It is routinely introduced in murder and rape cases as evidence of guilt; DNA databases have grown as even arrestees have been required to surrender DNA samples; and this evidence has been used to exonerate hundreds of convicted individuals. DNA evidence is generally revered as the “gold …

The Wisdom Of Universal Dna Collection: A Reply To Professor Meghan J. Ryan, Arnold Loewy

SMU Science and Technology Law Review

No abstract provided.

Lost Esi Under The Federal Rules Of Civil Procedure, Jeffrey A. Parness

SMU Science and Technology Law Review

In 2006, Federal Rule of Civil Procedure (FRCP) 37(e) came into effect, declaring that lost electronically stored information (ESI) could not prompt “sanctions … on a party” absent “exceptional circumstances.” Sanctions were limited to where the loss resulted from “the routine, good-faith operation of an electronic information system.” Effective December 1, 2015, Rule 37(e) now contemplates limited “measures … to cure the prejudice” caused by lost and irreplaceable ESI arising from a party’s failure “to take reasonable steps to preserve,” where the lost ESI “should have been preserved in the anticipation or conduct of litigation.” For more culpable conduct, the …

Is Your Roommate A Felon? Considering The Effect Of Criminalizing Password Sharing In Nosal Ii, London Ryynanen England

SMU Science and Technology Law Review

No abstract provided.

Vmg Salsoul, L.L.C. V. Ciccone: The Ninth Circuit Strikes A Pose, Applying The De Minimis Exception To Music Sampling, Jacob Quinn

SMU Science and Technology Law Review

No abstract provided.

You Can Run But You Can't Hide: Cell Phone Tracking Data Do Not Receive Fourth Amendment Protection, Merissa Sabol

SMU Science and Technology Law Review

No abstract provided.

A Peek Over The Great Firewall: A Breakdown Of China’S New Cybersecurity Law, Jacob Quinn

SMU Science and Technology Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Law Of Cyber Warfare: Restrictions, Opportunities And Loopholes, Nicholas Tsagourias

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

The article considers the applicability of existing international rules on the use of force to cyber attacks and assesses their effectiveness. The author’s conclusion is that the current regime on the use of force fails to capture the particularities of cyber attacks and for this reason he makes some tentative proposals for enhancing security in this area.

Siri-Ously 2.0: What Artificial Intelligence Reveals About The First Amendment, Toni M. Massaro, Helen Norton, Margot E. Kaminski

Publications

The First Amendment may protect speech by strong Artificial Intelligence (AI). In this Article, we support this provocative claim by expanding on earlier work, addressing significant concerns and challenges, and suggesting potential paths forward.

This is not a claim about the state of technology. Whether strong AI — as-yet-hypothetical machines that can actually think — will ever come to exist remains far from clear. It is instead a claim that discussing AI speech sheds light on key features of prevailing First Amendment doctrine and theory, including the surprising lack of humanness at its core.

Courts and commentators wrestling with free …

The Algorithm As A Human Artifact: Implications For Legal [Re]Search, Susan Nevelow Mart

Publications

The results of using the search algorithms in Westlaw, Lexis Advance, Fastcase, Google Scholar, Ravel, and Casetext are compared. Six groups of humans created six different algorithms, and the results are a testament to the variability of human problem solving. That variability has implications both for researching and teaching research.

Toys That Listen: A Study Of Parents, Children, And Internet-Connected Toys, Emily Mcreynolds, Sarah Hubbard, Timothy Lau, Aditya Saraf, Maya Cakmak, Franziska Roesner

Tech Policy Lab

Hello Barbie, CogniToys Dino, and Amazon Echo are part of a new wave of connected toys and gadgets for the home that listen. Unlike the smartphone, these devices are always on, blending into the background until needed. We conducted interviews with parent-child pairs in which they interacted with Hello Barbie and CogniToys Dino, shedding light on children’s expectations of the toys’ “intelligence” and parents’ privacy concerns and expectations for parental controls. We find that children were often unaware that others might be able to hear what was said to the toy, and that some parents draw connections between the toys …

Fetishizing Copies, Jessica Litman

Book Chapters

Our copyright laws encourage authors to create new works and communicate them to the public, because we hope that people will read the books, listen to the music, see the art, watch the films, run the software, and build and inhabit the buildings. That is the way that copyright promotes the Progress of Science. Recently, that not-very-controversial principle has collided with copyright owners’ conviction that they should be able to control, or at least collect royalties from, all uses of their works. A particularly ill-considered manifestation of this conviction is what I have decided to call copy-fetish. This is the …

War In The Expanse: The Metaphysics Of Cyberspace, Roy Balleste

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

No abstract provided.

Do They Want To Regulate Online Profiling?, Laura Garcia Vargas

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

Online profiling or behavioural tracking is the process by which private companies track and gather data about users’ activities in online platforms. The data collected by all the companies is aggregated with the purpose of creating a comprehensive profile about users. Since at least 15 years ago, there have been several attempts to regulate online profiling in order to reduce its privacy implications. In general, these regulations have tried to limit the way the information is used, the type of data that is collected, and impose or suggest the security standards that the companies should take to protect it.

This …

A Whole New Meaning To Having Our Head In The Clouds: Voice Recognition Technology, The Transmission Of Our Oral Communications To The Cloud And The Ability Of Canadian Law To Protect Us From The Dangers It Presents, Sarit K. Mizrahi

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

Voice recognition technology is now included in modern devices as a matter of course, being used in anything from our cellular telephones, to our televisions, and even the toys of our children. While we may voluntarily interact with some of our devices using this technology, such as conversing with Siri on our iPhones, many of us remain unaware as to the dangerous implications of using voice recognition technology.

Its ability to record some of our most personal conversations allows private companies to eavesdrop on us in an unprecedented manner and amass highly sensitive information about our lives that would have …

The Lawful Access Fallacy: Voluntary Warrantless Disclosures, Customer Privacy, And Government Requests For Subscriber Information, Matthew P. Ponsford

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

This paper explores the recent legal, political, privacy, and communications developments surrounding warrantless government requests for basic subscriber information. I assert the current practice remains marred in secrecy and therefore poses a significant threat to Canadian civil liberties and privacy rights.

Can You Hear Me Now? Conceptions Of Privacy In Section 8, Chris Sewrattan

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

This article will examine the different conceptions of privacy that are present in the jurisprudence of s. 8 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Section 8 guarantees that everyone has the right against unreasonable search and seizure. As a constitutional right, the protection covers the privacy relationship between the state and the individual. It confers privacy over information for which there exists a reasonable expectation of privacy. The article will analyze a taxonomy of four privacy conceptions present in the literature and discuss their presence in s. 8 case law. It will then examine two criticisms that arise …

Privacy And Insurance In Canada, England, And France - How Does The Responsible Insurer Put Guidelines And Procedures In Place For Retaining And Destroying Personal Information, Christopher Whitehead

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

In this article, I will be discussing records containing personal data or information, and how ‘‘guidelines and procedures” are ‘‘put . . . in place for retaining and destroying [such] information” by private-sector insurers carrying on business in Canada, England, and France. Where I discuss Canada, I use the examples of the law of Ontario — which belongs to the English legal tradition —and of Quebec — whose private law belongs to the French legal tradition. As it happens, these are the two traditions with which I have the most experience relating to personal information.

Front Matter

SMU Science and Technology Law Review

No abstract provided.

Every Algorithm Has A Pov, Susan Nevelow Mart

Publications

When legal researchers search in online databases for the information they need to solve a legal problem, they need to remember that the algorithms that are returning results to them were designed by humans. The world of legal research is a human-constructed world, and the biases and assumptions the teams of humans that construct the online world bring to the task are imported into the systems we use for research. This article takes a look at what happens when six different teams of humans set out to solve the same problem: how to return results relevant to a searcher’s query …

Research Algorithms Have A Point Of View: The Effect Of Human Decision Making On Your Search Results, Susan Nevelow Mart

Publications

No abstract provided.

The Dark Web: Some Thoughts For An Educated Debate, Vanessa Henri

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

The ‘‘dark web” is a part of cyberspace that is only accessible through an anonymity software, such as The Onion Router. This encrypted network has prompted important legal challenges. As jurisprudence develops, many factors are at risk of inhibiting users’ right to privacy. Misunderstandings of the dark web’s functioning or myths regarding its veil of anonymity has justified invasive criminal investigations that has threatened users’ right to remain anonymous online. This article discusses these challenges while analyzing current legal developments in the United States and Canada.

Has The Era Of Privacy Come To An End?, Avner Levin

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

This keynote address to the 2016 McGill Law Graduate Conference provides a brief history of privacy before discussing contemporary challenges in the form of increasing technological ability to create, store and process personal information, and powerful advocacy against privacy from both government and the private sector. In order for privacy to survive, a new set of personal information protection principles is required and new ways of enforcing these principles must be developed, which will leverage the power of technology to develop hybrid regulatory/ technological solutions, such as Google’s content removal tool.

Cyber Operations And The Humanization Of International Humanitarian Law: Problems And Prospects, Giacomo Biggio

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

The aim of International Humanitarian Law (‘‘IHL”) is to regulate the conduct of hostilities while, at the same time, balancing the two overarching concepts of military necessity and humanity. While the principle of military necessity allows a party to a conflict to exercise any amount of armed violence which is necessary for the accomplishment of a military purpose, the principle of humanity aims at minimizing the amount of physical violence caused to combatants and the civilian population. From the late 19th century onwards the principle of humanity has progressively eroded the domain of military necessity, influencing the creation and interpretation …

A Critical Assessment On The Extraterritorial Application Of Human Rights Treaties To Transnational Cyber Surveillance, Wanshu Cong

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

In this essay, I question the appropriateness of applying the substantive requirements of lawful domestic surveillance developed from international human rights treaties and relevant case law to transnational cyber surveillance. And I argue in the negative. Therefore, for the purpose of this essay, I would not delve into the highly debatable issue of what counts as ‘‘control” in cyber surveillance and which standard of control triggers a state’s jurisdiction. Instead, this essay assumes that a control test was established. In the following section, I shall examine the substantive requirements for states restricting fundamental freedoms drawn on from current human rights …

Third-Party Services As Potential Sources For Law Enforcement Procurement Of Genomic Data, Katherine Kwong

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

This paper examines two cases studies: Ancestry.com’s experience with law enforcement use of its genetic databases, and 23andMe’s responses to requests for users’ genomic data. Analyzing the responses to law enforcement requests by the two of the largest providers of third-party genomic services provides insight into the struggles third-party genomic services are likely to face and possible future directions for companies facing this type of law enforcement request.

Mitigating Cyber Risk In It Supply Chains, Maureen Wallace

Global Business Law Review

This note argues that the United States needs to utilize current federal agencies to begin introducing cyber supply chain risk management regulation for IT supply chains. Cyber supply chain risk management is a critical area of cybersecurity that has barely been recognized by the United States government. The globalization of the digital world has introduced a new spectrum of risk management issues that affect the products exchanged by businesses and consumed by individuals and government agencies. While there have been some initiatives toward the promotion of tighter cybersecurity regulation, most initiatives only concern the public sector, leaving the private sector …

“Hello…It’S Me. [Please Don’T Sue Me!]” Examining The Fcc’S Overbroad Calling Regulations Under The Tcpa, Marissa A. Potts

Brooklyn Law Review

Americans have received unwanted telemarketing calls for decades. In response to a rapid increase in pre-recorded calls made using autodialer devices, Congress enacted the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) in 1992. The TCPA imposes restrictions on calls made to consumers’ residences and wireless phones using autodialer devices, even if they are not telemarketing calls. Congress appointed the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to prescribe rules and regulations to enforce the TCPA. In 2015, the FCC released an order that defined autodialer more broadly under the statute. Consequently, devices that have the potential to become autodialers in the future, even if they …