E-Commerce Law

The legal implications related to internet use are vast. For the purposes of our departmental use, I will restrict the analysis to the potential market directly or incidentally affected by constructed websites. This market includes the following: vendors, service providers, consumers, information-providers, Internet Service Providers ("ISP") and employers.

Vendors and information-providers have to be aware of the intellectual property law implications as it relates to the material they provide on their websites. "The protection of intellectual property includes industrial property whether in the form of a company's patented technology, its trademark identity, or its copyrighted publications" (Module 6). Examples of intellectual property issues include trademark issues related to domain names (Module 6) and the "cloning of entire publications to webpages that have no relationship with the originator of the intellectual property. Domain names are regulated by a federal statute called the Anti-Cybersquatting Consumer Prot

its users about information disclosures (Minnesota Privacy Bill is Seen as a Wake-up Call to the Federal Government to Enact Legislation). Regulations have also been enacted by the EU and other foreign entities regarding the disclosure of consumer information (Module 14). Last but not least, consumers are also a part of the target market. Consumers will want to consult this department on their rights as to information provided by vendors and information disclosed by vendors and ISPs. II. Areas of Law There are several areas of law that would be relevant to website legal compliance. For the department, we would need attorneys who specialize in the areas of commercial transactions, international law, intellectual property law, constitutional law, employment law. Due to the global nature of websites, international law expertise will be pervasive in almost every other area of law involved. Ebusinesses are not immune from international laws and regulations, no matter where the businesses themselves are located. This was demonstrated in the Yahoo! case in which "Yahoo, the American corporation, was ordered by a French Court to implement technical or access control measures blocking auctions featuring Nazi memorabilia from Fre