July 2008
Thu, Jul, 31 2008
An inquiry panel established by a Government advisory body has recommended that many of the records on the UK's DNA database, the biggest in the world, be deleted. A ruling is still awaited from the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) on the issue.
Thu, Jul, 31 2008
The BBC has been fined £400,000 for conducting viewer and listener competitions unfairly. It is the highest fine ever imposed on the BBC by media regulator Ofcom.
Thu, Jul, 31 2008
The Financial Services Authority (FSA) has warned insurers to avoid using the term "consequential loss" in consumer insurance policies because most people don't know what it means.
Wed, Jul, 30 2008
NASA hacker Gary McKinnon has lost his appeal against extradition to the US. Five Law Lords have unanimously rejected his argument that plea bargaining by US prosecutors undermined his human rights.
Wed, Jul, 30 2008
The European Commission has proposed creating a single strategy for the protection of industrial property rights in Europe. The Commission wants to integrate its strategy for industrial property rights and encourage smaller businesses to protect rights.
Wed, Jul, 30 2008
A dispute between two of the world's biggest business software companies has escalated, with Oracle accusing SAP executives of knowing about a subsidiary's alleged downloading of five terabytes of Oracle software and documentation.
Wed, Jul, 30 2008
Europe's top court has been asked to help settle a case which could undermine the business model of top flight football. The European Court of Justice (ECJ) has been asked whether TV sports deals breach competition law.
Wed, Jul, 30 2008
The Government has published plans on how it might regulate the video on demand industry. It has also said that it is reluctant to relax rules on product placement on television.
Wed, Jul, 30 2008
A judge has said that expert evidence in trade mark disputes is rarely likely to be relevant when it comes to deciding if a consumer will be confused by two supposedly similar marks.
Wed, Jul, 30 2008
The film industry's US trade body has sued two websites because they provide links to copyright-infringing copies of films. The body said that it believes that the sites infringe copyright despite not hosting material themselves.
Tue, Jul, 29 2008
The popular Scrabble-like Facebook game Scrabulous has been suspended on the social networking platform. The game has been the subject of a fierce rights battle but had stayed available on the site until now.
Mon, Jul, 28 2008
Motor sport boss Max Moseley's victory in the High Court over a filmed spanking session is a "major blow" to newspapers' rights to publish articles about celebrities' private lives, one legal expert has warned.
Mon, Jul, 28 2008
A man has been ordered to pay £22,000 in damages for defamation and invasion of privacy over fake Facebook pages he created about a former friend.
Thu, Jul, 24 2008
One graduate in six lies to get a job in financial services, a survey of CVs has shown. The survey of nearly 4,000 CVs found that 17% of applicants for jobs in the financial sector lied at least once.
Thu, Jul, 24 2008
Superdrug's claim that it sold 960 everyday health and beauty products more cheaply than rival chemist Boots was misleading, the advertising watchdog has ruled.
Thu, Jul, 24 2008
The UK's six major internet service providers (ISPs) have agreed to write to 1,000 of their subscribers a week on behalf of the music and film industries warning them not to engage in copyright-infringing file-sharing.
Thu, Jul, 24 2008
A British couple has lost the battle to keep the narnia.mobi domain name which they claimed was only registered so that their son could have a Narnia-related email address. The address will transfer to a company representing CS Lewis's estate.
Thu, Jul, 24 2008
The European Court of Justice (ECJ) has said that disability discrimination laws can apply to the carers of disabled people as well as the disabled themselves. It has backed the claim of a woman who sued a London law firm in a groundbreaking case.
Wed, Jul, 23 2008
A horror film has been banned in Germany because it infringes on the personality rights of the German man who killed and ate a voluntary victim on Christmas Day in 2001.
Wed, Jul, 23 2008
Recent US patent rulings could undermine the patentability of software in the US at a stroke, a leading US patent expert has warned. Patents as lucrative as that of the PageRank system that underpins Google's business are under threat, the expert warned.
Wed, Jul, 23 2008
Equitable Life policyholders should receive compensation for "serial regulatory failures" that failed to prevent the near-collapse of the 240-year-old life insurance firm, according to the Parliamentary Ombudsman.
Wed, Jul, 23 2008
San Francisco City Council regained access to its own computer network today after Mayor Gavin Newsom convinced network administrator Terry Childs to give them the passwords.
Tue, Jul, 22 2008
A team of Dutch researchers has been given permission to publish details of how it cracked the security on which the pre-payment card for London's transport network is based.
Tue, Jul, 22 2008
The European Court of Human Rights has ordered the Finnish government to pay out €34,000 because it failed to protect a citizen's personal data. One data protection expert said that the case creates a vital link between data security and human rights.
Tue, Jul, 22 2008
The data protection guidance given to police forces on when to delete records of criminal convictions is inadequate, according to the body which hears appeals under the Data Protection Act.
Fri, Jul, 18 2008
A European Commission investigation has found that four in five websites selling mobile phone services such as ringtones appear to breach consumer protection rules.
Fri, Jul, 18 2008
A search engine that deletes all data relating to users after 48 hours has been awarded the first privacy award of a European body set up to promote privacy. The award was presented by European Data Protection Supervisor Peter Hustinx.
Fri, Jul, 18 2008
The sysadmin accused of locking the San Francisco city council out of its computer network was back in jail yesterday after pleading not guilty to four counts of computer tampering.
Thu, Jul, 17 2008
A feared trade agreement between the world's richest countries that opponents claimed would allow for the examining and impounding of iPods at airports is unlikely to result in such activities.
Thu, Jul, 17 2008
The premium-rate phone regulator will ban the use of the word 'free' in promotions for premium-rate services and will put an immediate stop to entire services that do not respond to users' request that they stop sending messages.
Thu, Jul, 17 2008
A US district court judge yesterday ordered SCO to pay Novell $2.5m for unjust enrichment, breach of fiduciary duty and conversion.
Wed, Jul, 16 2008
The user IDs and internet protocol (IP) addresses of everyone who has ever watched a video on YouTube will not now be sent by its parent company Google to Viacom after a climb-down by the television company.
Wed, Jul, 16 2008
The European Commission has proposed a Directive that would give performers rights over recordings for 95 years after the recording. The change would give a player on a recording rights for the same length of time as the writer of the material.
Wed, Jul, 16 2008
A committee of data protection regulators has developed a toolkit to help global companies comply with EU laws that control overseas transfers of personal data within their groups. The toolkit encourages use of so-called Binding Corporate Rules (BCRs).
Wed, Jul, 16 2008
Apple has been cleared of misleading potential iPhone customers by exaggerating the quality of its display. The UK's advertising watchdog rejected a complaint that a London Underground poster showed better quality pictures than the iPhone could reproduce.
Wed, Jul, 16 2008
The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) is inviting views on whether to change English law to enable people with pleural plaques caused by workplace asbestos to claim compensation.
Wed, Jul, 16 2008
A new deal between the UK Government and insurers means flood insurance cover will remain widely available for homeowners and small businesses.
Tue, Jul, 15 2008
Privacy regulator the Information Commissioner has issued HM Revenue and Customs and the Ministry of Defence with official warnings after the loss of millions of people's personal data.
Tue, Jul, 15 2008
A German court has said that the owner of a home wireless network is not responsible for the activity of other people on that network. The decision overturns a lower court's ruling that the network owner was responsible for the copyright infringement.
Tue, Jul, 15 2008
EBay does not have to pre-screen its auctions for counterfeits of trade marked goods, a US court has ruled in a case that could have threatened the entire business model of the online auction site.
Mon, Jul, 14 2008
The Information Commissioner has repeated his call for more powers to protect personal data and has said that local authorities should not be selling the electoral roll to marketers.
Mon, Jul, 14 2008
Europe's highest court could strengthen the rights of database creators to protect their work. One of the European Court of Justice's Advocates General has issued an opinion backing a German University's right to stop others using information it compiled.
Mon, Jul, 14 2008
General remarks made by an employer can be the basis of a discrimination claim, Europe's highest court has ruled. The European Court of Justice (ECJ) ruling says a discrimination case is possible even when no individual is involved.
Thu, Jul, 10 2008
A US company offering traffic-tracking technology to ISPs who want to generate highly targeted advertising will face questions from the US Senate this week. Privacy advocates have said that use of the technology might break anti-spying laws.
Thu, Jul, 10 2008
The body in charge of the .uk internet domain has announced changes to its dispute resolution policies that will make it cheaper to win unopposed disputes but will not address the high cost of preparing cases.
Thu, Jul, 10 2008
Building society Bradford and Bingley (B&B) has been criticised by the UK's advertising watchdog over an internet competition and has been told to change the way it runs competitions in the future.
Thu, Jul, 10 2008
Almost 90% of financial services firms were unable to measure whether they are treating their customers fairly as at the end of March this year, according to the FSA. They now risk missing a December deadline to consistently treat customers fairly.
Thu, Jul, 10 2008
Ryanair has claimed a German court victory against a tour company it has accused of screen scraping its website against its wishes. The airline said that Hamburg Regional Court has awarded it an injunction against Vtours.
Wed, Jul, 9 2008
The House of Lords has overturned decisions of the Court of Session and the Scottish Information Commissioner and required the Commissioner to re-examine a request for access to medical statistics.
Wed, Jul, 9 2008
The UK Intellectual Property Office (UK-IPO) will attempt to clear up uncertainty and doubt about an exception to patent law for researchers, moving to end a lack of clarity about which acts are illegal and which are allowed.
Wed, Jul, 9 2008
Ryanair is taking a Dutch airline website to court over the 'screen scraping' of Ryanair's site. The no frills airline claims that Dutch company Bravofly's activities violate the site's terms and conditions and infringe its intellectual property rights.
Wed, Jul, 9 2008
Peers are calling for a reversal of rules that stop UK victims reporting cybercrimes directly to the police. The House of Lords science committee is also encouraging the government to introduce a data breach notification law.
Tue, Jul, 8 2008
The UK's privacy watchdog has said that EU privacy laws are out of date and in need of reform. The Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) has commissioned a research firm to look into how the law could be changed.
Tue, Jul, 8 2008
A European Parliament committee has rejected the European Commission's plans for an EU-wide telecoms regulator. The MEPs have proposed an alternative body which will have fewer powers.
Tue, Jul, 8 2008
Online retailers must now use an additional layer of security to protect credit cards from fraud, but experts have said that many card processors have missed last week's industry-set deadline.
Tue, Jul, 8 2008
A link can be established between two similar trade marks even if they have been registered for completely different goods and services, one of the European Union's Advocates General has said.
Mon, Jul, 7 2008
A privacy pressure group has told Google that its Street View photography service might break the law. But the company says that its technical measures will safeguard people's privacy.
Mon, Jul, 7 2008
Users of YouTube will have their access details handed over to entertainment giant Viacom and the English football Premier League after a US judge ordered the disclosure of a 12 terabyte database.
Mon, Jul, 7 2008
Google has added a link to its privacy policy from its sparse front page, bowing to pressure from privacy activists. Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin were involved in the decision, according to a Google executive.
Mon, Jul, 7 2008
France has suggested an amendment to the pan-European Telecoms Package, which would bar broadband access to anyone who persists in illegally downloading music or films.
Thu, Jul, 3 2008
Google's Street View photography cars have been spotted on the streets of London. The company started its first European data gathering for the service in April in Italy.
Thu, Jul, 3 2008
Virgin Media has said that a threat sent out to 800 of its customers that they could be disconnected from the internet because of alleged copyright infringement was a mistake.
Thu, Jul, 3 2008
A London court has come down in favour of a games publisher in four cases in which it claimed that the users had been illegally downloading and sharing computer games on the internet.
Thu, Jul, 3 2008
The Scottish Government is considering extending freedom of information (FOI) legislation to cover private bodies which perform public functions. One FOI expert says, though, that most of its suggestions would require no change to the law.
Wed, Jul, 2 2008
A newspaper has been censured for placing video content on its website which invaded a woman's privacy by showing the inside of her home.
Wed, Jul, 2 2008
Belgian newspaper lobby group Copiepresse has had its copyright infringement case against the European Commission thrown out of a Belgian court, but says that it will re-submit the case to a civil court
Wed, Jul, 2 2008
The UK Government's surveillance practices violate the privacy rights of UK and foreign citizens, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has ruled. The judgment follows a nine-year battle over phone and internet taps
Wed, Jul, 2 2008
Virgin Media misled customers by suggesting they could download television shows quickly using its broadband internet when in fact many peak time users' connections would be slowed down when trying to do so, the UK's advertising regulator has said.
Tue, Jul, 1 2008
Online auction site eBay has been fined £31.5 million and ordered to forbid the sale of some luxury perfumes in a French court order designed to battle the sale of counterfeit luxury goods.
Tue, Jul, 1 2008
Europe's highest court will be asked to rule whether broadcasters can stop pubs from showing Premiership football using foreign satellite services. The pubs argue that their use of decoding equipment is lawful.
Tue, Jul, 1 2008
No major electronics manufacturer can be considered green in its processes or commitments to recycling, according to the latest report from Greenpeace.
Tue, Jul, 1 2008
The Competition Commission will investigate whether a plan by the BBC, ITV and Channel 4 to offer their programmes all through one website is anti-competitive.
