Technorati Tags: Creative Commons
I am a fan of the simplicity of Creative Commons and just wanted to highlight this article on how it works and how to use it.
I am a fan of the simplicity of Creative Commons and just wanted to highlight this article on how it works and how to use it.
In Ng Koo Kay Benedit v Zim Integrated Shipping Service [2010] SGHC 47, Justic Lai Siu Chiu nicely summarized the evidentiary requirements to prove a claim of defamation arising from statements published on a website and via email.
The fact that a defamatory statement is published on a website does not per se lead to the conclusion that there has been substantial publication of the defamatory statement. In fact in the above case, the judge did not find that there was substantial publication. The court may draw an inference of publication but in the end, the burden of proof is on the plaintiff to prove publication.
Interestingly, there a challenge by the defendant that the plaintiff had failed to prove that the spreadsheet list of recipients of the alleged defamatory email was a “computer output” under s 35 of the Evidence Act. As I was reading this I was getting fearful that any electronic document produced in court would require “a certificate from the person responsible for the operation or management of the computer” per s 36 of the Evidence Act.
The judge rightly, in my opinion, agreed with the House of Lords in R v Shepherd [1993] AC 380 that it was “possible to discharge the burden by calling a witness who is familiar with the operation of the computer in the sense of knowing what the computer is required to do and who can say that it is doing it properly.”
Further, there was no allegation that the computer in question was malfunctioning or that the list of recipients was inaccurate. The judge found that substantial publication via email had taken place on the basis that there were 1,776 names listed and it was more than likely that not an insubstantial number of persons would have downloaded and read the email.
Over dinner with some friends a couple of nights ago, we had a short debate about what disclosures should be made by the author of a blog post. Anonymous blogging and the attendant comments have interesting ethical considerations.
It is possible to blog anonymously however if you become good at it, you will eventually be found out. Fake Steve was probably one of the funniest anonymous bloggers but he was finally outed by the New York Times in 2007. It is easier to comment anonymously. I do believe that if you have the strength of your convictions anonymity is not the way to go. I am of the school of taking responsibility for views expressed openly. If you are not prepared to stand behind your views, you should simply keep them to yourself.
I have come across a number of guidelines as to what constitutes ethical blogging. <Note to self: in a future post publish links to these guidelines> Some people are surprised that there is an unspoken code of conduct amongst serious bloggers. Some of this code is becoming institutionalized.
In the United States, the FTC recently published a guide regarding the endorsement of products in new media (aka blogs). It’s worth a read but if you want the Cliffs notes version, read the NYT article. In Singapore the Media Development Authority of Singapore is considering something similar.
With that in mind, I recently came across this apology by Michael Arrington of TechCrunch where it was revealed one the interns for TechCrunch has asked for and had received a Macbook Air in exchange for a post. The intern’s remorseful mea culpa is here.
That got me thinking as to why there are people who don’t seem to get that there are certain bright lines you do not cross. As I blog, I am always thinking about whether anything I write can be interpreted wrongly. Lawyers in particular run a higher risk of running afoul of issues pertaining not only to ethical issues but also considerations such as malpractice, advertising and disclosure of client sensitive information.
I do worry about everything I write publicly. This is harder than writing to a client since that communication is protected by attorney-client privilege. Once you say or do something stupid on the Internet, the genie is out of the bottle.
I ran across this article a month late but it’s still relevant and current. The article is headlined “5 Tech Entrepreneurship events that rocked SG in 2009.” I wanted to re-emphasize one point where the author states, with respect to the TechCrunch vs Fusion Garage dispute, “We have learned two important lessons from this whole fiasco: one, contractual agreements are necessary for a partnership; two getting investors who do not understand the tech space are (sic) a bad idea ….”
Having spoken to folks in the Singapore tech scene the TechCrunch vs Fusion Garage is indeed a wake up call to the fact that there is more to a start up than just coding. Intellectual property at the end of the day is what is being developed and if you don’t protect it, it’s pretty much worthless. Having done numerous deals with back to back agreements in place, there is still room for disagreement. What more if you don’t have agreements in place?
As for the last point, I can understand the point being made although it is an overstatement in my view. Having investors who really know technology can be debilitating if the investor tries to micromanage everything.
I read this blog post by Brian Krebs (who btw has deep insights into computer security issues) and at first blush I thought it was ridiculous that a bank would not only have the audacity to sue its customer after losing the customer’s money but would also ask the court to rule that its security procedures were compliant.
On further reflection, I started to think about the duty owed by the bank to its customers and the duty of a customer to keep his/her computer, passwords, personal information, network etc secure. The rights and responsibilities of a bank towards its customer in traditional banking models have evolved over many decades with courts and legislation fine tuning with the banks generally having the onus of protecting their customer,
I don’t believe that the law can ever match the specificity of each and every exploit and breach because of the pace of technology and daily efforts to devise new ways to exploit any vulnerability, human or otherwise. There are vulnerabilities in any network but the end user, bank or customer, is also personally susceptible to being exploited. Hence the trend towards social engineering ie phishing to extract your personal information. We all want to see <insert name of latest celeb> nude don’t we?
Laws should be written in sufficiently broad (but not in too broad terms) to capture the essence of the wrong doing and the courts should be able to interpret the law to fit the specific scenario.
I wonder whether different standards of responsibility should apply to individual consumers versus businesses. Should a small business expect to have the same network security as a multi-national bank?
At the end of day, it really pays to read the terms of use if you intend to undertake online banking. However it is more likely to snow in hell than being able to get a bank to modify its terms of use. But at least you will know where you stand.
Coming back to the headline, with due respect to the court, I don’t think the court can or even should be in the role of determining whether a computer network meets certain security standards. I don’t think computer security experts can even agree on this. But it is an aggressive move by the bank to shift blame for the loss to the customer. Let’s see how this plays out.
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