The CAN-SPAM Act is the federal act that preempts state anti-spam laws. In response to this federal statute, California, and many other states have passed similar anti-spam laws. Do you have a new company that needs to market to a broader community? Will your company create an email list to…
Internet Lawyer Blog
Cloud Computing Laws and Regulations
There has been a surge of new laws and regulations passed by governments to implement security and privacy measures for companies storing information in the cloud. This surge is due to recent security breaches and the realization of how much information can be compromised. Information stored in the cloud ranges…
Controlling Online Piracy and Counterfeiting
In 2011, Congress proposed two relatively similar bills—House of Representatives’ Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and Senate’s Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property Act (PIPA)—that legislators and lobbyists hailed as providing important protections against piracy and counterfeiting online. Yet, this apparently strong support was…
Brand Management and Social Media
Since the goal of brand management is to optimize the market’s perception of a brand, it follows that effective brand management requires establishing and maintaining a relationship with the target market. Recently, much of relationship development has been accomplished through social media. Although, brand awareness can expand with social media,…
Crowdfunding: Protecting Intellectual Property
Crowdfunding involves a large number of people contributing small amounts of money to finance a business venture, typically an early-stage startup company. Over the past several years, online crowdfunding platforms have become a popular tool for new businesses and entrepreneurs to market inventions, generate revenue, and increase customer base. While…
Smartphone GPS Tracking
With technological advances rendering complex cellular devices increasingly affordable, the majority of the world population is now using smartphones. Further, applications that employ global positioning system (GPS) tracking allow these worldwide smartphone users to take advantage of location-specific information and social networking. In addition, GPS technologies have aided law enforcement…
Drones, Privacy Concerns and Regulations
The recreational use of drones, or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV), has become increasingly popular in the United States. While such use has gone largely unregulated due to the unlikeliness that these drones will obstruct air traffic, commercial and governmental use of drones—especially larger drones—has sparked safety and privacy concerns leading…
The Legality of Penny Auctions
In an online penny auction, participants purchase bids for a fee, with each bid placed on a particular item increasing the price of the item by a small increment (e.g., one penny) and extending the bidding period for that item by a few seconds. The last participant to place a…
Protecting Against Data Breaches
The recent cyberattack on Anthem, Inc., one of the largest health insurance companies in the United States, illustrates the persistence and severity of the risk of data breaches. On February 4, 2015, Anthem confirmed that one of its databases had been hacked. The data breach exposed personal information of approximately…
Moving Towards Net Neutrality
Net neutrality refers to the principle that Internet service providers and governments should treat all Internet traffic equally, regardless of the source. Among other implications, net neutrality includes the idea that a website should not be given the option to pay an Internet service provider a premium to speed up…