Articles about The Law

Snowdon (not Snowden) is the name of the tallest mountain in Wales and while by Swiss or Colorado standards it may not seem like much the weather on Snowdon is unpredictable and has taken many lives. I climbed Snowdon as a schoolboy with my class and that day on the mountain another school group was lost in a blizzard and some boys died. This is what first came to mind when I heard about National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden leaking documents and fleeing to Hong Kong. Like his namesake mountain, this Snowden is trouble for those who are overconfident or unwary.

I’ve written about this general topic many times over the years and doing a search here and at PBS will yield a great deal that I’d rather not have to repeat. We’ve been here before. Maybe not so much in terms of there being a whistle-blower or a traitor (your choice of terms -- I’d say whistle-blower), but these surveillance programs are either old hat or logical extensions of what came before. I’m not defending them, I’m saying we shouldn’t be surprised they exist.

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In the light of last week’s PRISM revelations the major tech companies have all been quick to deny that they allow the NSA direct access to their servers. But they have also said that they respond to lawful requests for data and have been revealing the numbers involved.

Apple says it received between 4,000 and 5,000 requests from US federal, state and local law enforcement agencies for customer data between December 1, 2012 and May 31, 2013. In its press release Apple says, "Regardless of the circumstances, our Legal team conducts an evaluation of each request and, only if appropriate, we retrieve and deliver the narrowest possible set of information to the authorities. In fact, from time to time when we see inconsistencies or inaccuracies in a request, we will refuse to fulfill it". Apple also says that certain types of data such as iMessage and FaceTime conversations along with Map searches and Siri requests are not retained in an identifiable form.

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The South China Morning Post is the next stop on Snowden’s media tour. Not to discuss the NSA’s surveillance on American citizens, but the agency’s work in China. You read that right, that’s not a typo.

Snowden tells the (semi) independent Hong Kong paper that the NSA’s PRISM program is used against companies and people within China, and that the US government is and has been hacking into computers in both China and Hong Kong for at least four years.

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On June 13, 2013,  a coalition of law enforcement, consumer groups and political leaders named “S.O.S” (Secure Our Smartphones), called for a “kill switch” to be installed in every smartphone. The concept of this kill switch is simple -- when a smartphone is stolen, the owner can have the device permanently disabled. Approximately 1.6 million people in the USA had a mobile device stolen in 2012 and a third of all robberies involves a stolen cell phone -- it is a serious problem. The hope is that overall smartphone theft would be reduced as a disabled device would be worthless.

While the concept makes sense from a law enforcement standpoint, the possibility of misuse and abuse is astronomical and threatens our liberty and freedoms. Once the kill switch is built into these devices, we lose a certain level of autonomy. There will be the potential for a government agency (domestic or foreign), corporation or hackers to disable our devices by using this kill switch for evil purposes. In other words: who will control the kill switch?

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It sounds like something from the Cold War, but it is happening today. A top secret court order requires Verizon to hand over telephone records for millions of its subscribers to the NSA on an "ongoing daily basis". The order, in place since April this year, forces the telecom company to hand over a range of "tangible things" about phone calls placed within the US and to foreign countries.

This is not entirely unprecedented -- the recording of telephone data has long been used as a means of gathering intelligence during periods of war -- but this time things are a little different. Not only was the court order passed in secret, but there are no specific targets to the operation. It would be quite normal for the call of suspected terrorists or other criminals to be logged and recorded, but in this instance all phone calls are considered fair game.

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Working with the FBI and authorities in 80 other countries, Microsoft's Digital Crimes Unit has disrupted a major cybercrime ring. The operation has targeted 1,400 systems involved in running the Citadel botnet.

Citadel is thought to have infected as many as 5 million PCs worldwide and has been used to steal from major financial institutions including American Express, Bank of America and PayPal, accounting for losses of up to half a billion dollars to companies and individuals worldwide. The Citadel botnet is hosted using pirated versions of XP. Once the virus -- which first appeared in early 2012 -- infects a user's machine it blocks access to legitimate antivirus sites and disables installed antivirus applications making it hard to detect and remove.

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British libel law is a veritable minefield and the difficulty of policing many aspects of the internet mean that websites and social networks have often been treated rather differently to newspapers and magazines. But a court ruling means that this is set to change. A judge has ruled that a 46 character tweet made by Sally Bercow, wife of the Speaker of the House of Commons, John Bercow, is indeed libellous.

The tweet read "Why is Lord McAlpine trending? *Innocent face*". For the uninitiated, Lord McAlpine is the former Deputy Chairman and Party Treasurer of the Conservative Party and he denied claims that he was involved in alleged sexual abuse at a Welsh foster care home in the 70s and 80s.

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Courts ordering ISPs to block access to known torrent sites is nothing new -- UK ISPs have already been told that the likes of the Pirate Bay, Kickass Torrents, H33T and Fenopy are out of bounds -- but Sky Broadband has decided, seemingly of its own volition, to take things a step further. Not content with following the letter of the law and preventing subscribers from accessing a number of well-known torrent sites, the ISP is widening its net and blocking access to torrent proxies.

Proxies are a common means of bypassing restrictions that may have been put in place by ISPs or employers, and there are countless sites and services that exist with the sole purpose of enabling users to access blocked torrent sites. While court rulings have publicly named a number of sites, the list of domains that Sky and other ISPs feel duty-bound to block remains rather more secretive.

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153,000 iPhone and iPod owners are in line for a payout from Apple after the company agreed to a $53 million settlement to a 2010 lawsuit. The class action suit concerned malfunctioning devices that the Cupertino, Calif. based company claimed had been damaged after coming into contact with water.

A "liquid damage policy" allowed Apple to deny warranty coverage if the liquid indicator inside the device changed color from white to pink or red, "proving" contact with water.

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We all know that the internet is home to illegal software, music, movies and much more. It may seem like an impossible task to put figures to piracy levels, but a report by Ofcom, the independent regulator for the communications industries in the UK, has done just that. The Online Copyright Infringement Tracker report found that a staggering 30 percent of regular downloaders of media did so illegally.

The report looked at the period from November 2012 to January 2013 and analyzed UK consumption of online music, film, TV programmes, books, games and software. Compared to the previous three months, the percentage of web users accessing any of this type of content increased from 57 percent to 60 percent.

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It takes an honorable person to support something that impacts them negatively (or conversely, be against something that impacts them positively). In other words, it is noble to support what is right rather than what is right for you. Some may view such an act as lunacy. For instance, I support the Internet Sales Tax Bill (Marketplace Fairness Act).

When it comes to Internet Sales Tax, you too should be honorable and support equality instead of looking out for your own interests. Anyone who is against the bill is simply selfish. Internet sales tax will impact your wallet. It will make you spend more money.

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The European Union's Competition Commission has ruled that Motorola Mobility (owned by Google) abused its position in the German mobile market by filing a patent injunction against Apple.

Motorola won an injunction related to Apple products using data transmission technology in February 2012. The fruit-logo company offered to pay a licence fee for the patents but the companies failed to agree on a price. A number of Apple products, including iPad and severall iPhone models, were taken off sale in Germany during the dispute.

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The Dutch government has revealed plans to give the police extra powers to fight cybercrime. Under the proposed new law officers would be given the right to hack into computers, read emails, install spyware and delete files. They could also be authorised to tap VoIP calls and break into servers located outside the country if they were being used to host DDoS attacks.

The country’s Justice Minister Ivo Opstelten says that the powers would be used under strict control and that the approval of a judge would be needed before the police could carry out these actions.

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I have a question for you? Is 24-month financing the same as 2-year contract for service? Washington State attorney general believes so. He calls T-Mobile's "no contract" plans deceptive. Last week, the carrier agreed to making changes, paying court fees and offering customers refunds on phones purchased between March 26 and April 25.

About 45 minutes ago, I got email from T-Mobile offering full refunds on devices purchased during the time period (that would be iPhone 5 for my daughter and father-in-law). I live in California, not Washington State, but T-Mobile is headquartered there. So the court order is farther-reaching, which is why I'm posting today.

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Following an investigation by the European Commission into whether Google unfairly promoted its own services, the search giant has agreed to make some changes to the way results are displayed.

Google will more clearly label search results that link to YouTube, Google Maps and its other sites. The Commission has proposed that these changes run for a month whilst it collects public feedback. The EC will then decide whether to make them legally binding for five years, in which case an independent monitor would be appointed to oversee proper implementation.

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