Commercial Law

The courts have taken varying approaches to determining the basis of stock that is received by an insurance policyholder in exchange for the policyholder's surrender of membership rights in a mutual insurance company, in a "demutualization" transaction. While this may seem to be a narrow and abstruse question, the approaches taken by the courts may have application in other areas of the tax law affecting analogous transactions.

As the CEO and founder of IPCybercrime, my team and I have developed a systematic approach to investigating the online sale of fake branded goods. We work with law firms and corporate counsel to build cases against the counterfeiters. In the last decade, we've assisted in shutting down hundreds of thousands of websites offering counterfeit goods for sale. In many cases, $100s of millions were at stake.

Data breaches continue to escalate and garner national attention. The most recent news-making incident was the hack of electronic toy maker, VTech.

An important part of a professional photographer's life, and that of a photographer's attorney, is protecting the intellectual property produced by that photographer. Many photographers properly compile photographs from unrelated sources and register the photographs in an effort to protect their property rights in the images. Group registration of those images has enabled a much more efficient registration process, but does registration provide the statutory damage protections one might assume should be available?

Many believe that we are on the precipice of a deluge of litigation ' both individual and multiparty/class action ' concerning how an individual's data is handled and the remedy, if any, if that data is misused or wrongfully disclosed. A case recently argued before the U.S. Supreme Court involves the intersection of the Internet and privacy laws and may affect the future of litigation against companies that operate on the Web as well as traditional brick-and-mortar businesses.

True Lease Versus Security Interest

In ClearCorrect Operating, LLC v. ITC, the Federal Circuit limited the ITC's jurisdiction over digital commerce. In a 2-1 decision, the panel held that the ITC lacks authority to regulate digital imports.

The IASB and the FASB have completed decision-making meetings and the respective staffs are drafting the final rules, which will be signed and issued this month. The IASB and FASB will issue separate rules as they have chosen two different models for lessee accounting. They both have adopted the same lessor model with a few minor differences.