Internet Law Commons^™

Technologies-That-Must-Not-Be-Named: Understanding And Implementing Advanced Search Technologies In E-Discovery, Jacob Tingen

Law Student Publications

Even for those who are aware of the existence of advanced search and review tactics beyond keyword search, many questions remain for attorneys and judges alike. First, what are the new and emerging technologies? While courts and commentators mention the existence of the technologies, there is not much guidance with regard to what the new technologies are and what they accomplish. Second, are the new technologies superior to the manual review process? Understandably, attorneys are hesitant to use an unfamiliar e-discovery product that may not work better than the e-discovery process to which they are already accustomed. Third, if attorneys …

Public Forum 2.1: Public Higher Education Institutions And Social Media, Robert H. Jerry Ii, Lyrissa Barnett Lidsky

UF Law Faculty Publications

Like most of us, public colleges and universities increasingly are communicating via Facebook, Second Life, YouTube, Twitter and other social media. Unlike most of us, public colleges and universities are government actors, and their social media communications present complex administrative and First Amendment challenges. The authors of this article — one the dean of a major public university law school responsible for directing its social media strategies, the other a scholar of social media and the First Amendment — have combined their expertise to help public university officials address these challenges. To that end, this article first examines current and …

Limits Of The Federal Wiretap Act's Ability To Protect Against Wi-Fi Sniffing, Mani Potnuru

Michigan Law Review

Adoption of Wi-Fi wireless technology continues to see explosive growth. However many users still operate their home Wi-Fi networks in unsecured mode or use publicly available unsecured Wi-Fi networks, thus exposing their communications to the dangers of "packet sniffing," a technique used for eavesdropping on a network. Some have argued that communications over unsecured Wi-Fi networks are "readily accessible to the general public" and that such communications are therefore excluded from the broad protections of the Federal Wiretap Act against intentional interception of electronic communications. This Note examines the Federal Wiretap Act and argues that the current Act's treatment of …

The Benefit Of Adopting Comprehensive Standards Of Monitoring Employee Technology Use In The Workplace, Karin M. Mika

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

This article will examine issues as they relate to the privacy of employees’ lives given that nearly everything can be discovered by some form of electronic monitoring. It will posit that most laws as they exist today do little to apprise either the employer or the employee as to what type of electronic monitoring of personal communications is acceptable. It will further propose that most employer policies related to scrutinizing employee electronic communications are vague and unsuitable. The article will conclude that, given the leeway employers tend to be given (often justifiably so) in monitoring employees there is little chance …

Liable For Your Lies: Misrepresentation Law As A Mechanism For Regulating Behavior On Social Networking Sites, Geelan Fahimy

Pepperdine Law Review

No abstract provided.

Managing The Impact Of New Media On The Employment Relationship, Susan A. O'Sullivan-Gavin, John H. Shannon

The Journal of Business, Entrepreneurship & the Law

Attention to privacy issues in the workplace has increased over the past two decades as use of electronic mail and text messages has made these means of communication commonplace. Beyond text messages and emails, employees can access the internet at their place of employment at many different entry points. This access can be through company issued desktops or laptops, mobile phones, mobile internet devices (MIDs), Smartphone technology (photography; video and voice recording capabilities; file transfer and storage), off-site internet connections, Wi-Fi access or hot spots. Employees can access and/or post information on various sites including blogs, wikis, RSS feeds, instant …

Access For All: A Review Of “Law Libraries, Government Transparency, And The Internet,” A Presentation By Daniel Schuman Of The Sunlight Foundation At The All-Sis Meeting, July 22, 2012, Susan David Demaine

Articles by Maurer Faculty

Attendees at the ALL-SIS Breakfast and Business Meeting at the AALL Annual Meeting had the pleasure of hearing from Daniel Schuman of the Sunlight Foundation speak on “Law Libraries, Government Transparency, and the Internet.” The Sunlight Foundation is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization whose mission is to increase access to federal government information resources through advocacy and the development of information technology tools.

Rulemaking Vs. Democracy: Judging And Nudging Public Participation That Counts , Cynthia R. Farina, Mary Newhart, Josiah Heidt, Cornell Erulemaking Initiative

Michigan Journal of Environmental & Administrative Law

This Article considers how open government “magical thinking” around technology has infused efforts to increase public participation in rulemaking. We propose a framework for assessing the value of technology-enabled rulemaking participation and offer specific principles of participation-system design, which are based on conceptual work and practical experience in the Regulation Room project at Cornell University. An underlying assumption of open government enthusiasts is that more public participation will lead to better government policymaking: If we use technology to give people easier opportunities to participate in public policymaking, they will use these opportunities to participate effectively. However, experience thus far with …

Mistaken Identity, Identity Theft And Problems Of Remote Authentication In E-Commerce, Eliza Mik

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

The problem of mistaken identity in e-commerce transactions brings together seemingly unrelated issues: privacy, network security, digital signatures – and classic contract law. The technological characteristics of the Internet have a tendency to turn traditional legal doctrines on their head, or, at least expose flaws in existing legal arguments. Combining an academic exercise with the practical implications of the insecurity of the Internet, this paper draws some unexpected conclusions regarding cases of mistaken identity. The latter must be analysed afresh with a number of factors in mind: the more widespread use of fictitious identities in on-line transactions, the higher incidence …

Satellites And Municipalities: One Town’S Use Of Google Earth For Residential Surveillance, Edward Knoedler

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Walled Gardens Of Privacy Or “Binding Corporate Rules?”: A Critical Look At International Protection Of Online Privacy, Joanna Kulesza

University of Arkansas at Little Rock Law Review

A growing concern in the era of cloud computing is protecting Internet users' privacy. This concern is compounded by the fact that there are no effective international solutions. This article considers the latest European Union (EU) proposed development in this area – a regulatory model based on amended Binding Corporate Rules (BCR) – as introduced by the EU Justice Commissioner. These planned changes would have worldwide effects on international companies' online activities in transboundary cyberspace.

After providing a background on the concept of defining privacy in general, the article describes the BCR proposal, and proceeds to consider the likelihood of …

Quantifying The Economic Benefits Of Effective Redress: Large E-Commerce Data Sets And The Cost-Benefit Case For Investing In Dispute Resolution, Colin Rule

University of Arkansas at Little Rock Law Review

Demonstrating the economic benefit of investments in fair and effective redress systems has been one of the greatest challenges for dispute resolution. This article uses results from large e-commerce data sets to demonstrate the quantifiable benefit in of investments in effective dispute resolution processes. Specifically, the data is based not on user-reported satisfaction, which can be unreliable, but instead on an analysis of the actual behavior of users before and after a dispute event. The result is hard evidence of the economic benefits from the deployment of effective redress processes, which is relevant to e-commerce service providers, as well as …

Building Bridges To Remedies For Consumers In International Conflicts, Amy J. Schmitz

University of Arkansas at Little Rock Law Review

This essay addresses the lack of consumer remedy mechanism, and attempts to open consideration of expanded use of online processes for resolving business-to-consumer (B2C) eConflicts. Specifically, the essay attempts to highlight the problems created by problematic and uncertain enforcement of B2C arbitration, and proposes the use of the Internet to create fair and globally enforceable Online Dispute Resolution and Online Arbitration (OArb) mechanisms. These mechanisms would capitalize on the growth and efficiency of the Internet while protecting consumers from burdensome and/or expensive procedures that render existing remedies meaningless.

The essay begins by discussing the importance of fair and accepted B2C …

Who Are You? Difficulties In Obtaining Trademark Protection For Domain Names, Luke M. Rona

Washington Journal of Law, Technology & Arts

Three appellate decisions illustrate the difficulty of acquiring trademark protection for domain names that include a top-level domain (“TLD”), such as “.com.” Courts have characterized these marks as generic or merely descriptive, which carries implications for the party seeking registration: generic marks cannot be protected, while descriptive marks can, assuming they possess a secondary meaning that makes the mark distinctive. Generic and descriptive domain names often indicate the services a company provides, with the addition of the “.com” TLD to indicate online services. One key test of genericness is whether the public identifies the mark with a service generally or …

Defamation Via Hyperlinks: More Than Meets The Eye, Gary Kok Yew Chan

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Hyperlinks make the World Wide Web go round. They find and connect information and content from a wealth of sources on the web including, from time to time, defamatory material. Newton, the owner and operator of a website in British Columbia, posted an article entitled “Free Speech in Canada”. The article itself was not alleged to be defamatory of Crookes, a politician. However, it incorporated hyperlinks to other internet websites that contained defamatory material. Notwithstanding requests from Crookes and his lawyer, Newton refused to remove the hyperlinks. Did Newton’s act of hyperlinking to internet websites constitute “publication” of the defamatory …

Proposal For An International Convention On Online Gambling, Marketa Trimble

Scholarly Works

The proposal, which will be published as a chapter in a volume from the Internet Gaming Regulation Symposium co-organized by the William S. Boyd School of Law of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, in May 2012, presents the outline of an international convention ('Convention') that will facilitate cooperation among countries in enforcement of their online gambling regulations while allowing the countries to maintain their individual legal approaches to online gambling. Countries continue to vary in their approaches - some permit and regulate, and others prohibit online gambling, and even countries that permit and regulate online gambling approach the issue …

Understanding The Internet As A Human Right, Michael Karanicolas

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

Around the world, fundamental human rights have undergone a dramatic conceptual shift as a result of the spread of the Internet. The right to freedom of expression, once largely limited to printing, has exploded in a digital world that provides users with an unprecedented megaphone to broadcast their views. The right to political participation and the right to free assembly have similarly been reborn in an age of instant communication, allowing activists to mobilise hundreds of thousands of followers with a single email, text or tweet. Although these are the most notable examples, the Internet has also had a transformative …

Harvesting The "Forbidden Fruit" Of Biotechnology Research: Genetic Engineering, International Law And The Patentability Of Higher Life Forms In Canada, Eugene C. Lim

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

As the frontiers of science are constantly redefined by the emergence of new technology, patent law often has to struggle to keep pace with the changing conception of what constitutes a protectable “invention”. A key challenge facing patent law in the age of biotechnology lies in ascertaining the extent to which genetically engineered life forms should be protected. A major concern relates to whether such life forms should be excluded from patentability on grounds of ordre public, ethics and morality.

This article critically explores the extent to which patent law in Canada protects this “forbidden fruit” of biotechnological innovation, and …

The Limitations Of Regulatory Oversight On Online Video, Jennifer Simpson

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

Discussion in this paper focuses on the factors, attributes, and elements of telecom and broadcast regulation in Canada. Part I of this study briefly outlines the history of online video regulation in Canada to date. In Part II speculation as to how online video might be regulated, based on prior decisions of the CRTC, is presented. Part III considers the challenges of applying the Broadcasting Act to new media entities in order to create a regulatory framework for online video. Part IV looks at judicial decisions related to broadcast law that may be used to define the nature of the …

A Delicate Balance: Defining The Line Between Open Civil Proceedings And The Protection Of Children In The Online Digital Era, Courtney Retter, Shaheen Shariff

Canadian Journal of Law and Technology

He thought of the telescreen with its never-sleeping ear. They could spy upon you night and day, but if you kept your head you could still outwit them. [. . .] They could lay bare in the utmost detail everything that you had done or said or thought; but the inner heart, whose workings were mysterious even to yourself, remained impregnable.

— George Orwell, 1984

On Thursday September 27, 2012, a few months after our paper was written, the Supreme Court of Canada solidified the rights of children victimized by cyberbullying in the landmark decision of AB (Litigation Guardian of) …