Chapter 4

Legal Issues

Agenda

• Internet Legal Environment

• Web Site Problems

• Encryption

• Dark Site

Agenda

• Internet Legal Environment

• Web Site Problems

• Encryption

• Dark Site

Internet Legal Environment

• Global village without global laws

• Different laws in different countries

• Culture differences

• Buyer and seller in two different countries

• Web server’s location

Agenda

• Internet Legal Environment

• Web Site Problems

• Encryption

• Dark Site

Web Site Problems

• Internet Shopping Disputes

• Domain Name

• Linking and Framing

• Content Liability

• Intellectual Property

Internet Shopping Disputes

• Types– Customer pays but merchant does not deliver– Customer pays but merchant deliver wrong

goods or in less quantity or broken– Customer pays but money does not arrive at the

seller– Merchant delivers but customer refuses to pay– Merchant delivers but customer has not ordered

anything

Internet Shopping Disputes

• Solution– Online terms and conditions that comply with

the laws of every country– Which law applied in the event of dispute– Present on home page and link provided form

any web page

Domain Name

• Definition– Translate numeric IP address into a friendly text

– Fit the business name logotype or trademark

• Preventing legal battle– Check for existing trademarks

– Check for famous marks

– Register trademark

– Check foreign countries

Link and Framing

• Illegal linking– large scale deep linking

• Illegal framing– Framing content from other web site for reducing

download time and increasing visits

• Solution– Clear and accessible disclaimers on web page

– Program to tracking the deep linking and framing

Content liability

• Content liability varies in different countries

• Solution– Create a disclaimer and rules– Forbid certain material on the server

Intellectual Property

• Problem– Images– Sound– Program– Database

• Regulated by international agreements• Internet information is free• Internet information can not be reused for

commercial purposes

Agenda

• Internet Legal Environment

• Web Site Problems

• Encryption

• Dark Site

Encryption

• Different rules in different countries• Key escrow

– Government keeps a copy of encryption key

• Legal encryption export– Legal for printed paper format– Illegal for digital format

• Digital signature– Legal binding for e-business

Agenda

• Internet Legal Environment

• Web Site Problems

• Encryption

• Dark Site

Dark Site

• Purpose– Crisis management for defects of products, – Negative campaigning by unhappy, or angry online

users, or competitors

• Contents– Unreleased negative information of products

• Strategy– Develop plans for emergency– Check web sites, newsgroups, search engines and

database on a regular basis– React fast and offensively– Outsourcing (digital complaint service)

Discussion

• How do you change your IT department structure to handle these legal and crisis management issues?

• How do you incorporate these legal and crisis management issues into your e-business systems development process?

Points to Remember

• Internet Legal Environment

• Web Site Problems

• Encryption

• Dark Site