contract and Copyright Infringement

Jacobsen’s copyright infringement claim would probably be unremarkable in any other case that lacked so many precedent-making issues, and perhaps it remains unremarkable despite this context. However, it is an assertion of a fairly thin copyright on behalf of a free software project that otherwise is extremely generous in granting permissions for downstream copying, modifying, and distributing its works. To be fair, Jacobsen, who was also in attendance at oral argument, clearly does not relish litigation and would prefer to write model train software in peace. Only when Katzer sent demand letters requesting significant patent licensing fees and when Katzer’s allegations made Jacobsen feel that his reputation and even job were jeopardized did he determine that litigating the case to clear his name was essential. Furthermore, if Jacobsen’s allegations are true, it is one thing for a free software project to grant a generous license to those who agree to abide by its terms, including particularly attribution, and quite another thing for that free software project to be expected to acquiesce in someone stripping out all such attributions and passing off the project’s work as their own for commercial gain. Nonetheless, because the copyrighted work at issue in this case is a selection and arrangement of data, it represents a type of copyrighted work that many free software proponents would, in many cases, prefer not be copyrightable at all but due to there is lack of sufficient contract elements sometimes parties catch in trouble.
so we should be careful about the contract very much.

electronic coupons contract

Response Reward Systems v. Meijer Inc. 189 F. Supp. 2d 1332 (M.D. Fla. 2002)
Response Reward, a Florida company, owns patents on issuing electronic coupons
Meijer, Inc. is a Michigan corporation that operates supermarkets
Meijer operated a website that offered electronic coupons
Response Reward alleged that Meijer was infringing its patents
Response Reward could have sued in Michigan, where Meijer was located. Instead, it sued in Florida
The Florida long-arm statute permits jurisdiction over a defendant who is “engaged in substantial and not isolated activity” within Florida
Meijer’s website was accessible from anywhere, but Meijer
was not licensed in Florida
had no offices, stores, employees or property in Florida
did not advertise in Florida
issued coupons which could not be used in Florida
BUT, some stores owned by others accepted the coupons in Florida
The Florida long-arm statute, as interpreted by the Florida courts, permits jurisdiction over a defendant who commits an act outside Florida that causes damage within Florida, e.g. patent infringement
Is it constitutional for Florida to exercise jurisdiction over Meijer?
No. Meijer did not have minimum contracts with Florida.
Think about it. Should there be jurisdiction just because the patent owner happens to be in Florida?
https://www.rfcexpress.com/lawsuit-related-cases.asp?ID=24641

Contractual Liability

I found a very interesting case about contractual liability that I’d like to share with you:

Salvage Assoc’n v’s CAP, 1995
March 1987: Salvage Association contracted CAP Financial Services to develop specs for an accounting system
July 1987: specs delivered & accepted
Further contract for CAP to implement the specified system by May 1988
However, delays & problems emerged… Errors were found in the specification…
Problems with telecoms link…
Key staff left project…
CAP proposed “re-analysis & re-design” , Salvage organised an independent review
Consultants said CAP plan was impossible
Salvage terminated & filed for damages…
Salvage went to court and claimed damages of £800,000 to recover costs, also claiming CAP’s liability limitation clause (£25,000) was unfair
The judge ruled for Salvage:
 Salvage were justified in terminating contract – it was clear CAP could not deliver a system
 CAP’s limitation clause breached the Unfair Contract Terms Act 1977 – any such limitation had to be reasonable; CAP’s wasn’t.

do you think judge made a good decision?
In my point of view the judge made a good decision due to CAP did not act in terms of the contract and they had to examine the software before sell or implementing in other organization, but also salvage should ask Consultants befor accepting the contract , do you agree?

Hijacking the Digital Signature!

All of us know about digital signature but for whom that did not know digital signature is a piece of data that identifies the beginner of a document. It utilizes asymmetric encryption, where one key (private key) is used to create the signature code and a different but related key (public key) is used to verify it.
BUT as you know it has some problems: Security and confidentiality of private key, possible misuse and the legal implications which arise.
Usually criminal use it for hijacking: first an authenticated user had established with a remote service for this attack, the target was chosen to be the e-government portal. The web application that handles access to the financial information of a citizen requires the user to digitally sign a document to prove her /his identity. If a digital signature is used to authenticate a user to a remote application, the relaying server can let the packets through until the login process is complete. Then, it can interrupt the communication to the victim, thereby hijacking the user’s session; when the login is successful the server issues a session cookie. This cookie is used in subsequent requests by the browser to tag these requests as being sent by the previously authenticated user. The first attack uses Internet Explorer to steal the session cookie after a successful login procedure, thus allowing an attacker to duplicate the session. To steal the session cookie, the attacker requires local access to the victim’s machine with the privileges of the user running the browser. The easiest way to perform the attack is a malicious browser plug-in!
With browser helper objects, one can write components (specifically, in-process Component Object Model (COM) components) that Internet Explorer will load each time it starts up. Such objects run in the same memory context as the browser and can perform any action on the available windows and modules. Through a special interface, the browser helper object can access the functions of Internet Explorer, thus being able to read and manipulate data.(read more :http://www.iseclab.org/papers/citizen_technical.pdf)
As you know anybody can put you in trouble if they could easily access to your signature and they can contract with many parties and abuse it to self interest!

Another court deals major blow to DVD copting

A California appeals court on Wednesday overturned a lower court ruling that had paved the way for a $10,000 DVD copying system called Kaleidescape and other products from the company with the same name.

The 6th District Court of Appeal in San Jose, California, was the second court in two days to rule that companies are bound (.pdf) by the entire Content Scramble System licensing regime, which prevents duplicating DVDs.

A San Francisco federal judge ruled late Tuesday that RealNetworks’ DVD-copying software was a breach of the Content Scramble System license, which is required for DVDs and computers to play DVDs. The license allows DVD players to descramble the encrypted code on a DVD, but the license prohibits the duplication of a DVD. Both RealNetworks and Kaleidescape claimed a loophole in the CSS license allowed the copying of DVDs.

In both cases, Kaleidescape of Sunnyvale, California, and RealNetworks, of Seattle, claim that the CSS license issued by a partner of the motion picture studios — the DVD Copy Control Association — did not require, as the studios alleged, that a DVD be in the machine to play back the movie. Hence, a copy could be made, they claimed.


court decision did not immediately block Kaleidescape from marketing its wares. Instead, it ordered a lower court to review the entire CSS contract to determine whether Kaleidescape’s DVD-copying machines are in breach of contract.

A lower state court had ruled that, because some of the terms of the contract were forwarded to Kaleidescape after the deal was signed years ago, the company was not obliged to follow them — including specifications that the DVD be in the machine during playback.

The Kaleidescape case dealt almost exclusively with California contract law. A ruling in favor of Kaleidescape likely would have presented a showdown between prevailing interests — California contract law and the DMCA
Do you agree?
Read More http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/08/another-court-deals-major-blow-to-dvd-copying/#ixzz0qWSMzhu3

Hackers launch "Contract of Settlements" attack on inboxes

The emails, which have the subject line "Contact of Settlements", pretend to relate to a contract. Recipients are told that if they agree to the terms of the contract they should expect "payment on Friday for the first consignment".
Attached to the emails is a password-protected ZIP file, contract_1.zip, which contains a malicious Trojan horse. Sophos is intercepting the emails as spam, and has added detection of the malware component as Troj/Agent-LNW.

I, myself sometimes feel so curious about an unsolicited contract materialising in my inbox BUT I know if I'll enter the password to decrypt the file, open the file contained within means end up infecting my PC.
This latest attempt to infect the computers of innocent internet owners echoes a series of attacks we saw late in 2008, many of which used the names of well-known companies as an extra temptation for users to open them.so please becareful!
as you see it is oneof the type of computer crime in cyberlaw and it has illegal action

contract malware spammed out

The malicious messages that are being spammed out are pretending to be changes to a contract - some related to business activities with well known firms like Johnson & Johnson, Starbucks or Google, and others pretending to be connected with a retirement plan.The dangerous files attached to these emails in the samples we're seeing in our traps are called contract.zip or New_Contract.zip. Sophos intercepts them as Troj/Invo-Zip.
If you use other vendors' products, make sure that they are properly updated and capable of stopping these threats.
this is also another computer crime in cyberlaw.