IN THIS ISSUE
Internet libel in Ireland over sandwich abuse - Free ISP ads slammed in US - Dot BIZ names available from next week - iManage breaks into Brazil - Smith Bernal expands in Asia Pacific - Copitrak opens in Hong Kong - Microsoft to adopt EU data protection rules - FSA powerless on bank account aggregators - Equifax to offer digital certificates - Electronic discovery on the agenda - Fighting bogus internet patents

SANDWICH MAKER IN JAM FOR CALLING RIVAL A TART
In what is believed to be the first libel case involving the internet in the Republic of Ireland, Judge Carroll Moran last week ordered sandwich maker Francis Kenny to pay compensation to rival sandwich maker Maureen Walker after police discovered that Kenny had maliciously posted Walker's name and phone number on a web site listing prostitution and call girl services in Ireland. Walker only discovered what happened when her sandwich shop starting being bombarded with phone calls wanting to arrange sexual liaisons with "Exclusive Maureen". Kenny, whose business has now closed, has agreed to pay Walker a confidential sum - described as "greatly in excess of $11,000" - and still faces sentencing on criminal charges relating to the case.

FREE INTERNET SERVICE PROVIDERS SLAMMED IN US
First it was ISPs in the UK who came under fire for being less-than-clear about just how free their "free" internet services really were - and now the Federal Trade Commission in the United States has taken action against two US companies accused of using deceptive advertising to promote free internet services.

Although the two companies in question - Juno Online Services and Gateway Inc - have not admitted any wrongdoing, they have agreed to change their advertising and refund any improper charges made to subscribers as part of the deal to settle the FTC charges.

The FTC had accused Juno of making it hard for consumers to cancel a free trial offer by not publishing the phone number they needed to ring to make a cancellation. It was also alleged that those consumers who did manage to reach the line were kept on hold for so long that many gave up. Juno also promised consumers 150 hours for a free trial but did not tell them the trial only lasted one month. The FTC also said that in many cases the software for the service did not arrive until the trial period was half over. In addition, Juno did not inform consumers that they might incur long distance charges.

The FTC said Gateway, the PC manufacturer, did not adequately warn consumers that its "free" Gateway.net internet service included long distance fees of $3.95 an hour for rural users and $1.50 for local access over 150 hours per month.

DOMAINS NAMES - NEW DOT BIZ TO BE AVAILABLE FROM NEXT WEEK
The internet regulatory body ICANN has confirmed it has finalised accreditation agreements with various top-level domain (TLD) registries and that the new .biz domains will be available from next week (21st May). The .info name will be registerable from June. Rather more controversially, ICANN says its expects the US Department of Commerce to approve its new agreement with VeriSign that will extend VeriSign's dominance of the .com domain name registration market. However following earlier concerns raised by the US Department of Justice about the potentially anti-competitive nature of the deal, the Commerce Department is expected to impose a number of additional conditions on VeriSign, which has already agreed to surrender control of the.nert and .org suffixes.

iMANAGE BREAKS INTO BRAZIL
Document management systems developer iManage has broken into the Brazilian legal market with Machado Meyer Sendacz e Opice Advogados - one of the top three legal firms in Brazil - selecting the iManage WorkSite product to support its DMS activities. The agreement also marks the first customer win to result from the alliance announced earlier this month between iManage and Brazilian legal systems specialist BCS.
www.bcsinfo.com.br

SMITH BERNAL EXPANDS IN ASIA PACIFIC REGION
Smith Bernal International, the world's largest provider of transcription services, is expanding its court reporting service in Asia with the opening of a new office in Singapore and the launch of the Talkwriteback digital audio recording service in the region. The move also means Smith Bernal is the only company with CAT (computer assisted transcription) court reporters resident is Singapore. Smith Bernal opened its first Asian office in Hong Kong in 1994. The company's operations manager for Asia is Vicky Harris - vicky.harris@smithbernal.com.hk

COPITRAK OPENS IN HONG KONG
Copitrak Systems has opened a new office in Hong Kong and its new Pacific Rim subsidiary Copitrak Systems Asia is setting up a dealer network for its law office costs recovery systems across the whole of South East Asia. For details of either the product or dealership opportunities call Philippe Raynaud or Mark Gower on +852 2549 8019 or email philipper@copitrak-asia.com

MICROSOFT TO SAIL INTO EU SAFE HARBOR
Earlier this week Microsoft said it was planning to sign up for the safe harbor agreement between the EU and the US on the transfer of personal data across the Atlantic and indicated that it would be adopting the EU's data protection rules as the basis for its global privacy policies. Although the EU rules have been strongly criticised by the US Government for being "unduly burdensome" and "incompatible with real world operations", Microsoft's director of corporate privacy Richard Purcell said "responsible data management practices designed to protect individual privacy make good business sense". He also added that senior management within US companies "must become engaged in growing consumer anxiety about privacy".

WATCHDOG BARKS OFFLINE
Meanwhile in the UK, the new Financial Services Authority - which is building itself a role on a par with the US SEC - has just admitted that it has no power to regulate the activities of 'online aggegators'. These are internet sites that bring together accounts data from different banks and online financial services operations so the user can see all their records on one page rather than having to log onto each service separately. Although apparently a convenient service for bank customers - Virgin Money predict such services "will be the dominant way people manage their finances online with five or ten years" - what concerns the FSA are the fraud, privacy and security issues of such services as customers will have to hand over confidential accounts details and password to the aggregation service for each account they want displayed.

EQUIFAX BECOMES FIRST DIGITAL CERTIFICATE SUPPLIER
Equifax Secure, the e-commerce division of Equifax plc, has been selected as the first online issuer of digital certificates for use with the electronic transactions that can be submitted through the Government Gateway - the newly launched secure infrastructure for e-Government services in the UK.

The initial three transactions enabled by the Gateway are electronic submission of IACS Area Aid Applications from MAFF, VAT Returns from Her Majesty's Customs & Excise and PAYE end of year filing for Inland Revenue. Additional Government departments will introduce electronic transaction submission through the Gateway later this year.

Equifax Secure is currently the only Government appointed digital certificate authority that is able to process certificate registration and issue the certificate online. The company is offering businesses the opportunity to purchase a SecureMark digital certificate to enable them to submit their government forms securely over the internet. Businesses can apply for a SecureMark certificate through the Equifax Secure web site at www.equifaxsecure.co.uk

ELECTRONIC DISCOVERY ON AGENDA FOR BNA FORUM
The increasingly hot topic of electronic discovery - how do you deal with all the evidence that may or may or not be buried in the other side's email and wordprocessing archives - will be on the agenda at the the Bureau of National Affairs (BNA) Litigation Forum on Electronic Discovery in Washington CD on 11th June. The seminar "Who Pays for Production?" will focus on the cost burden of electronic discovery and takes place at the Omni Shoreham Hotel in Washington, starting at 1:45pm - see http://ediscoveryforum.pf.com for more details.

The speaker panel includes David Baldwin, director of technology at Ibis Consulting, Christopher Cook, a partner at Jones Day Reavis & Pogue, and Carl Person, a New York attorney, who will discuss a hypothetical anti-trust case that will illustrate the impact that electronic discovery has on companiesâ operations and financial health. Kenneth Withers, attorney and research associate at the Federal Judicial Center, will moderate the event.

David Baldwin will also preview Ibis iEstimate, a proprietary tool that can provide a law firm or corporation with the cost of an electronic discovery project within a 5 percent accuracy rate based on pre-existing benchmarks and analysis including average number of images per file and average percentage of files that may require manual handling.

Baldwin told Legal News Media that "A request for emails and electronic documents no longer translates into a blanket argument for unreasonable burden. With the tools that are currently available to help manage these materials, cost of compliance issues don't carry the same weight as they have in the past. The truth is that electronic discovery costs do not have to cripple a case. These days, technology can help lawyers get control over huge amounts of data and help them budget accordingly. The cost of producing electronic evidence is not as unpredictable as it once was."

MOVE TO FIGHT BOGUS INTERNET PATENTS
Two organisations - intellectual property company IP.com and open source advocacy group Foresight Institute - have teamed up to launch PriorArt.org, a service designed to halt the increasing number of bogus patents on software and other such internet technologies that are now being claimed.

The service will allow software developers to publish, at no cost, a brief description of their software innovation in IP.com's OpenTech database - a practice commonly referred to as 'defensive publishing'. Then, under agreements between IP.com and various patent offices worldwide, this open source 'prior art' database will be made available to patent examiners during their review of all new patent applications, ensuring that patents are not granted on previously disclosed ideas.

Such public disclosure of invention is vital as patents (and the monopoly rights that go with them) are, by law, supposed to be granted only to truly novel inventions. But, due to the unprecedented increase in patent activity in recent years, patent offices concede that they are unable to search all the relevant prior art during its review of patent applications.

Commenting on the venture Tom Colson, the CEO of IP.com said: "By helping to eliminate bad patents, PriorArt.org will not only protect open source development - which is the most important innovation on the Net - but also enhance the success of firms with truly-valid patent claims. It's a win for everyone."

From the publishers of Legal Technology Insider. Click here for the latest legal IT jobs, events diary and additional law reports. Next issue - 24.05.2001