LJN Newsletters

As part of states' efforts to shield their residents against the fraud and other crime that might be perpetrated against them in the name of a sham charity, most charitable organizations must register within the state in which they are domiciled. Thirty-eight states and the District of Columbia, for instance, require charities to register in-state, and to file financial and other information prior to soliciting in those states. States, however, also routinely impose their registration requirements on out-of-state charities that solicit in state in traditional ways (eg, by having solicitors enter the state) or over the Internet. Charitable organizations that use the Internet to solicit contributions must register if they use their Internet solicitation specifically to target people in that state, or receive Internet contributions from the state on a repeated, ongoing basis, or what's defined as "a substantial basis."

The recent report of a possible compromise of information among as many as 40 million MasterCard customers demonstrated in frightening clarity the potential for digital data breaches as more and more information is stored and manipulated electronically by more and more people. For many companies, the issue has an impact on operations and marketing, quite aside from the dangers of potential legal liability.
More than ever, e-commerce firms are vulnerable to such problems and would do well to heed counsel's advice to take steps to avoid compromises and legal liability.

Whether investigating new product-name availability or domain-name squatters and cybershysters, fee-based Web trademark search services do corporate legal departments' legwork. They also provide attorneys and staff with slick online tools to review and act on the information uncovered.

Information technology has become an invaluable business tool around the world. With it, businesses ' the traditional kind and those that operate over wires (and wirelessly) ' including law firms are able to increase efficiency and lower costs. After all, information technology is the gateway to one of the e-commerce sector's most important assets: Information.
But what happens when information cannot be trusted? When it is vulnerable and exposed to Internet threats? When information is secure, it is trustworthy; anything less than that, and it simply loses its value.

e-Commerce veterans may think they know how to read a business contract, and for most contracts, they're right, because checking what has been typed onto a preprinted form ' the price, deliverables and delivery date ' is usually enough to know.
But the provisions of tech contracts that really affect success may not be so obvious. Contract boilerplates often hide traps for the uninitiated. Merely reading the language specifically added to a form may not reveal the actual risks lurking in the contract.

Recent cases in e-commerce law and in the e-commerce industry.

A group of 29 organizations has formed a group that will follow an open process to develop a reference model describing the concepts and relationships that comprise the electronic discovery processes. Called the Electronic Discovery Reference Model Project, the group will develop The Electronic Discovery Reference Model (EDRM) that will provide a common, flexible and extensible framework for the development, selection, evaluation and use of electronic discovery products and services.

Ideally, most of an attorney's time will be devoted to the needs of clients. In the real world however, attorneys can waste valuable hours every week searching…