In April 2002, the FTC obtained a judgment and permanent injunction in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennyslvania barring cybersquatter John Zuccarini from continuing an extensive cyberscam. It involved diverting individuals from their intended website destinations to the more than 5,300 sites he owned, through the use of commonly occuring misspellings… Continue Reading
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Category Archives: E-Commerce
New EU Data Protection Proposal
The European Commission on Data Protection Working Party issued a new directive on January 29 addressing the protection of personal online data and the enforcement of IP rights. The Working Document, On-line Authentication Services, is here. Continue Reading
FTC Settles Student Data Collection Dispute
The Federal Trade Commission filed a complaint against the Educational Research Center of America, Inc. stating the company had “collected personal information from high school and middle and junior high school students through surveys,” and used this data “to create lists of students that it sells to commercial entities for use in marketing.” A copy… Continue Reading
Verizon Fights to Protect Consumer Privacy
Verizon is appealing the district court’s decision compelling the ISP to release customer data to RIAA in a copyright dispute concerning music downloading. According to Verizon’s deputy general counsel, “If this ruling stands, consumers will be caught in a digital dragnet – not only from record companies alleging infringement of their copyright monopolies – but… Continue Reading
UCLA Internet Report
The UCLA Center for Communication Policy today released the third installment of their report, Surveying the Digital Future. The report addresses topics that include the following; Internet Users – Who is Online, Who is Not; Media Use and Trust; Consumer Behavior, Communications Patterns, Social Effects of the Internet (on family, children, friends, politics); the Internet… Continue Reading
Google Wins A Round With SearchKing
On January 13, the United States District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma, denied Search King’s motion for preliminary injunction against Google for tortious interference with contractual relations. See also this Slate article, Google-Opoly: The Game No One but Google Can Play. Continue Reading
RIAA Wins Battle With Verizon Over Customer Data
Judge John D. Bates, United States District Court for the District of Columbia, has ruled in favor of RIAA in their high profile case against Verizon to compel the ISP to provide personal data on customers’ use and online distribution of music obtained using P2P downloading applications. See Recording Industry of America v. Verizon Internet… Continue Reading
E-Commerce Dispute Resolution
For the past two years, an ABA task force of the Section of Dispute Resolution has studied the issue of consumer disputes as they apply to e-commerce transactions. A draft of their final report, that included recommendations and proposed guidelines, was released in April 2002. This ABA press release indicates that there is now a… Continue Reading
Throwing Stones at Search Engine Giant Google
This Business Week article provides perspective on Google’s growing pains, as the high profile, successful company (fielding an amazing 75% of all search engine queries) increasingly becomes the target of rivals in the advertising and e-commerce arenas. See also this Business Week review of Google’s beta web shopping network search engine, Froogle. Continue Reading
E-Commerce, Privacy and Fraud
eMarketer has published an article, Personal Information: The Push-Pull Between Companies & Consumers, that incorporates survey data collected by a number of organizations including, Harris Interactive, ConsumerWebWatch, and PricewaterhouseCoopers. E-privacy and ID theft concerns dominate consumer perspectives when conducting online transactions. In a related article, MSNBC reports on extensive credit card fraud complaints involving PayPal,… Continue Reading
Kazaa Will Fight Infringement Lawsuit
Via ZDNet there is news that Sharman Networks, the investment consortium based in Sydney, Australia that owns the popular and controversial P2P software Kazaa will fight the copyright infringement lawsuit brought against them in the U.S. District Court, Central District of California (CV 01-08541-SVW, CV 01-09923-SVW) by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios, after the court issued a 46… Continue Reading
Allen Introduces Bill on Net Taxes
This is actually a new posting on yet another net taxes moratorium bill, this one sponsored by Virginia Senator George Allen . “Senator Allen’s legislation will permanently ban taxes on Internet access, as well as taxes on Internet transactions by multiple jurisdictions, and discriminatory taxes that unfairly target Internet transactions.” The bill, the Internet Tax… Continue Reading
