Tech Legal

By Bryan Tan

Decipher courtroom jargons, stay on the right side of IT law

Archives for 2008

Registering a trade mark or patent? Read this

Friday, December 26 2008 11:01 AM

I have struggled to think of how to phrase this one but it is something I needed to say.

Increasingly, we have seen clients who have applied for U.S. or international intellectual property applications receive letters and e-mail offering them "international protection". These communications are received typically upon publication, where the registration details are made public.

I can understand the attraction--when you are charged with protecting your intellectual property, anything that seems reasonable and includes specific details of your intellectual property seems legitimate and hence should be obtained. However, things are seldom what they seem.

The thing to remember about intellectual property..... Read more ť

Tags: Intellectual Property, World Intellectual Property Organization, U.N., Patent, U.S., e-mail

Time for stricter harassment laws?

Monday, November 17 2008 12:43 AM

A remarkable scolding incident filmed on a handphone has appeared on Web sites. In it, a lady is seen launching a verbal barrage at a commuter standing in a commuter train. The five minute edited video seems to suggest a much longer period of filming in which the lady loudly proclaims in a mixture of Hokkien, Mandarin and English apparently stemming from an incident where some physical contact may have taken place in a crowded train.

Some pronouncement of the law is also spewed out by this lady (however, this should not be taken as legal advice--she ignored..... Read more ť

Tags: Harassment, Web Site, Singapore, video, battery, Web

The Microsoft 'black screen' of software legitimacy

Monday, November 03 2008 11:49 AM

Microsoft has come up with a new way of handling software piracy. Using its Windows Genuine Advantage tool, when a non-authorized version of its Windows XP Pro operating system is detected, every hour of use throws up a black screen that can be reset to anything else in the usual ways, but every 60 minutes it will change back to the plain black background. This will continue to happen until that copy of Windows is genuine.

This black screen is thus a very different one from Microsoft's well-known blue screen..... Read more ť

Tags: Black Screen, Software, hacking, China, Singapore, software license, software company, computer, Microsoft Windows, Microsoft Corp.

A melamine look at sticking with strict liability

Wednesday, September 24 2008 02:10 PM

Amid the tainted melamine milk product scandal in China, fingers are pointing in all directions and soon the knives will come out. While there exists finger-pointing in order to salvage reputation, the legal position on liability is quite clear. As a manufacturer of a product, two obligations are imposed--one is a contractual obligation, and the other is an obligation not to be negligent.

The contractual obligation requires that the product you sell works exactly like the product you claim it is. This is known as a strict obligation--it does not matter whose fault it is, as long as the product..... Read more ť

Tags: Manufacturer, China, QA, manufacturing, supplier, insurance company, lawyer, supply chain, monitoring, Chances

A shield for Web site owners?

Thursday, August 14 2008 01:22 PM

Web site owners around the world run into one common legal problem-liability for third-party content. Should a person be liable for content posted on a site by another, solely because he operates that Web site?

The possible scenarios vary from defamation on user forums (a hot favorite in Singapore) to hosting of pirated software and cracks on pirate sites. The attractiveness of such an avenue to found liabilty is simple--while the real perpetrator may be elusive, the Web site owner is easier to locate. The big boys are not immune, as eBay recently found, when it faced Read more ť

What should be in Singapore's localized Creative Commons?

Monday, August 11 2008 11:12 AM

A while back, the government was all for nurturing creativity in Singapore--so the news of the Creative Commons must have sounded a good step in that direction.

The last week of July saw the announcement that Singapore will launch its localized version of the Creative Commons. A Creative Commons license is based on the "some rights reserved" concept. It gives the copyright owner the ability to dictate how others may exercise the copyright rights, such as the right of others to copy the work, make derivative works or adaptations, to distribute and/or make money from the work. It..... Read more ť

The trouble with spam laws

Monday, August 04 2008 09:34 AM

I attended a recent briefing on Singapore's spam laws. While it was interesting and the speakers tried to get into the nuances of Singapore spam's legislation, the open floor round revealed some of the common problems plaguing spam laws.

First, everyone has a story to tell of his own spam experience...I get so many spam mail a day, or there is some irritating spam which I really hate, or I get some call center pushing some product over the phone. Second, everyone has his own..... Read more ť

Kidneys for sale: A case of self-defense?

Monday, July 14 2008 02:56 PM

The news over the past few weeks in Singapore is that a few people have been charged in relation to two transactions where kidneys were offered for sale. So far, two sellers, one would-be buyer and two middlemen have faced various charges under the Human Organ Transplant Act ("HOTA"). As these cases are pending, I do not propose to venture into discussing specifics.

While organ transplant is not typically what you will see in a tech-law column, I would add that its impact would be. In a world where technology has enabled procedures such as organ transplanting to be possible, the..... Read more ť

David takes on Goliath, in realm of copyright

Monday, July 07 2008 03:04 PM

On Saturday, news broke that Internet start-up RecordTV has sued Singapore's national broadcaster MediaCorp for revenue losses arising from MediaCorp's allegations that RecordTV's service, which allows users to download free-to-air programs and store them in an online database, infringes copyright laws.

RecordTV fired the first salvo last September by suing MediaCorp. It would be inappropriate to comment on the case while court proceedings are ongoing. This case will determine whether a service such as that offered by RecordTV, would constitute infringement of copyright.

Suffice it to say, to get to this stage, RecordTV probably used a little known provision in Singapore's..... Read more ť

Sign o' the times

Friday, June 06 2008 05:30 PM

I have just returned from speaking at an international forum called eNotarisation, eApostilles and Digital Evidence.

The notarization of documents is a function dating back a few centuries which facilities the production of a copy of a document without producing the original. In some instances, the notary can even attest to the execution of the document.

Around the world, many transactions require notarization, including the execution of property transactions, especially in the civil law countries. The volumes attested to by notaries amount to millions annually. This makes it an obvious candidate for executing this type of document online, by..... Read more ť

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About the blogger

Bryan Tan

Called to the Singapore and English Bars, Bryan Tan has practised in two of Singapores largest law firms and an international law firm. Bryan led many industry firsts including the first mass e-mail defamation case in the world, Singapores first publicised telecoms competition dispute, a pan-Asian co-branded travel portal, the first privately-funded cable landing project in Singapore and the world's first registrar-level domain name dispute. His areas of practice include information technology, telecommunications, biotechnology and bioinformatics, Chinese intellectual property, entertainment law and corporate work. He is also an author of Halsbury's Laws of Malaysia: E-Commerce. He also co-wrote the Singapore chapter of 'Digital Evidence' with Prof. Daniel Seng and is writing Halsbury's Laws of Singapore: E-Commerce.