Tech Law

Michael Santo of RealTechNews writes
In a move that should surprise no one, based on the number of studies over the past year linking MP3 players (particularly the iPod) with hearing loss (links later), a Louisiana man has filed a class action suit against Apple Computer for hearing loss attributed to the iPod.
Read More [...]

Jimmy Daniels of RealTechNews writes
Zone Labs announced that 180Solutions has dropped it’s lawsuit that sought to get them to change how they labeled their Zango and Search Assistant programs. No reason was released by 180, nor was this a settlement.
Read More on 180Solutions’ Lawsuit Here
[tags]realtechnews,jimmy daniels,180solutions,zone labs[/tags]

Jimmy Daniels of RealTechNews writes:
Another lawsuit has been leveled at an anti-spyware company, only this time, it’s not really an anti-spyware company. Secure Computer LLC of White Plains, N.Y has been sued for inducing computer users to download their software, an anti-spyware program that actually made the user’s security even weaker.
Read more on Washington State’s [...]

Jimmy Daniels of RealTechNews writes:
How’s that for a catchy title? Just saw this on MSN, the Supreme Court refused to hear the patent appeal from the maker of the Blackberry device, Research In Motion Ltd (RIM). The appeal asked the justices to decide whether the company, whose main really station is outside of the US [...]

Michael Santo of RealTechNews writes:
Before anyone says anything, yes, there were plenty of acronyms in the title. The EMI Group is considering a request by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) to review (through reverse engineering) its Digital Rights Management (DRM).
Read More about EMI, EFF and DRM Here
[tags]eff,security,michael santo,emi,drm< realtechnews[/tags]

Michael Santo of RealTechNews writes:
I was expecting something like this to happen eventually, especially with the flaps over Yahoo! and its part in helping Chinese officials convict a journalist accused of leaking state secrets, as well as Microsoft’s censoring of “freedom” and “democracy” last year on their Chinese portal, and the removal of an MSN [...]

Oh come on. There is no question that we need child friendly anti-spam laws and we need them now. How can anyone oppose this?

The Associated Press reports (via Wired.com):
It was Easter Sunday, and Patricia Santangelo was in church with her kids when she says the music recording industry peeked into her computer and decided to take her to court.
Santangelo says she has never downloaded a single song on her computer, but the industry didn’t see it that way. [...]

And even with cool technology like MMS, there can also be a dark side….

Incompatibilities among “copyleft” licenses meant to promote the sharing of creative work could end up preventing it, says cyber-law expert Lawrence Lessig.
No one would confuse cyber-lawyer Lawrence Lessig with Homer Simpson - symbol for all that is dumb about America. But Lessig, a professor of law at Stanford University in Palo Alto, CA, has spent [...]

Mod the new Xbox and pay the piper! Personally, I don’t see an issue with it just so long as no commercial gain is being made. Then again, perhaps I’m just being too lenient. To be fair however, the folks in the article below ventured way beyond common sense…

Lamont Wood of TechnologyReview.com writes:
Election officials must decide by January 1 which electronic voting system is least likely to cause problems next November.
The mid-term elections of 2006 are still 11 months away, but they’ve already generated a controversy - not over politics, but about what technology should be used to count all the votes.

Declan McCullagh of ZDNet.com writes:
Trust federal bureaucrats to take a good idea and transform it into a frightening proposal to track Americans wherever they drive.
The U.S. Department of Transportation has been handing millions of dollars to state governments for GPS-tracking pilot projects designed to track vehicles wherever they go. So far, Washington state and Oregon have [...]

It is a pretty sad state of affairs when the FBI is being taunted to this extent and realistically, there is very little that they can do about being used to fake people out!

The state of Texas has filed a lawsuit against Sony BMG over the rootkit-like digital rights management (DRM) software which Sony included on many of its music CDs. As reported here earlier, the software, provided to Sony by First4Internet, opened up a security hole on the PCs of any customer who attempted to put [...]

Michael Santo of RealTechNews writes:
I think Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) President Cary Sherman must have his head buried in the sand, as he seems to feel the actions of Sony BMG in the (what can only be termed) XCP fiasco have been “very responsible.” He made this statement in a university press round [...]

A lawsuit has been filed against Sony BMG over the recent discovery that Sony includes a rootkit on its music CDs.
The class action lawsuit filed against Sony BMG in California was filed by attorney Alan Himmelfarb on behalf of Californians who have purchased any Sony BMG CDs with the secret rootkit style software.

Michael Santo of RealTechNews writes:
“WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Class-action lawsuits against wireless telephone providers and manufacturers over radiation emissions will be able to go forward, after the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear an appeal by the companies. The high court rejected hearing an appeal by companies like Nokia and Cingular Wireless challenging a [...]

OK, let me get this straight. Some moron is suing Apple because of the belief that the iPod Nano is too easily scratched? That is officially the dumbest thing that I have ever heard of! Could this be the same dork that sued Mcdonalds over hot coffee?

Well now, welcome to the battle, FTC. In fairness, I suppose that up till now, the fuzziness of the laws surrounding spyware might make it difficult to combat the spyware problem. With any luck, this situation described below helps to clear things up.