Technology – Page 3

November 28, 2012

Bond Meets Bond Street: Mannequins are Watching You Shop

An Italian company, Almax S.p.A., is selling a mannequin (price tag about $5,000) in a development that is being closely watched – literally – by retailers, consumers and, of course, regulators and privacy gurus. The new product, marketed as the EyeSee Mannequin, contains a camera embedded in the mannequins eyes, and according to the company’s website: “This product will do much more; it would make it possible to ‘observe’ who is attracted by your windows and reveal important details about your customers: age range; gender; race; number of people and time spent.”

In Europe and the United States, the mannequins are making sporadic appearances – perhaps in showrooms and even in street-side display windows, gathering data as people saunter by the store gazing into the windows. According to reports, Almax may also be testing auditory capabilities that would allow a mannequin to not only see, but to hear what customers are saying as well. Hey, did you just call that mannequin a dummy?

(Image from Almax Website)

The EyeSee Mannequin has a camera placed as an “eye” that includes facial recognition technology that records information about passersby, such as their gender and race, and the software guesstimates the approximate age of each person scanned by the camera. Typically, cameras can be used in retail stores for security, but in many jurisdictions the shop owners are required to post signs alerting consumers browsing the aisles that they are subject to being recorded. Now, the EyeSee Mannequin gives retailers the ability to collect and store information for marketing purposes – a commercial purpose that may put the technology squarely under a microscope (these vision puns really must stop), since it collects personal data about individuals without their consent. That said, the current product is only supposed to record information, not any actual photographs or image scans, but . . . it could, couldn’t it?

Need to know more about the legal implications of technology in advertising and marketing? Concerned about your rights (and wrongs) in deploying surveillance equipment and gathering data and information about customers and consumers? Are you up-to-date on the latest privacy and compliance requirements? Not sure? Need to see these issues more clearly? OK, don’t be a dummy (I mean mannequin) and consult your lawyer. Don’t hesitate to contact me, Joseph I. Rosenbaum, or the Rimon lawyer with whom you regularly work. We would be happy to see you, hear you and help you.

October 11, 2012

New Jersey Casinos Permitted to Offer Mobile Gambling on Premises

In a press release dated October 9, 2012, the New Jersey Office of the Attorney General, Division of Gaming Enforcement, unveiled new temporary regulations applicable to mobile gaming in Atlantic City casinos. Procedurally, these regulations will remain in effect as of October 8 for 270 days, while the Division of Gaming Enforcement hopes to publish final regulations within 60 days.

With a focus on preventing underage gambling and protecting the security of mobile gaming, these new regulations will permit established and licensed casinos to enable mobile gambling on their property – ostensibly in every “recreational” area, but not in parking lots and garages. The regulations require providers of software and other technical means to exploit mobile gambling, to also obtain licenses as gaming-related service providers.

If you want to review the press release and materials, you can go to the New Jersey Office of the Attorney General website, or you can download and read a copy of the new temporary regulations right here N.J.A.C. 13:69O [PDF].

Of course, if you need help or more information, contact me, Joseph I. Rosenbaum (joseph.rosenbaum@rimonlaw.com), or any of the Rimon lawyers with whom you regularly work.

October 10, 2012

Insight from California’s Special Assistant Attorney General for Technology

In a recent interview with Travis LeBlanc, California’s Special Assistant Attorney General for Technology, Amy Mushahwar and Joshua Marker of Rimon’s Data Privacy, Security & Management practice, obtained some interesting insight on California’s new Privacy Protection and Enforcement Unit. Mr. LeBlanc addresses current and upcoming privacy trends, and the focus of California’s enforcement actions.

You can read the entire discussion and the insights obtained right here: Rimon Attorneys Interview Travis LeBlanc, of California’s New Privacy Protection and Enforcement Unit

As always, if you need help or more information, contact the Rimon lawyers mentioned above; me, Joseph I. Rosenbaum; or any of the Rimon lawyers with whom you regularly work.

July 17, 2012

MasterCard & Visa to Merchants: Let’s Settle This the Old Fashioned Way!

Whether you are a payment instrument (think credit, debit, gift, stored value, prepaid cards and more) expert or a retail merchant, a corporate purchasing manager or, like the rest of us, a consumer, you cannot have escaped the news, announced this past Friday (Friday the 13th), that Visa and MasterCard have agreed to settle a lawsuit brought by some merchants in connection with the fees merchants pay to be permitted to "accept" credit cards. I certainly couldn’t escape it. In fact, Joe Rosenbaum (that’s me) is quoted in yesterday’s American Banker article "‘We Won’ vs. ‘You Lost’: Reactions to Credit Card Settlement" written by Maria Aspan and Victoria Finkle.

While the settlement must still be approved by the court and provides billions of dollars in payments to merchants, the most contentious piece of this settlement relates to the so-called "interchange fees" (sometimes referred to as a "discount rate" – no pun intended) that refers to the charge imposed on merchants by the credit card associations and owners for their right to accept their branded credit cards from consumers.

When a merchant accepts a credit card, that merchant must have a relationship with the "brand" on the card (e.g., American Express®, Discover®, JCB®, MasterCard®, Visa®, Diners Club®, etc.), either directly or through a member institution. Because the brand owners operate vast settlement and transaction processing networks that allow you to use your card to buy a suit in Hong Kong or King Kong at a toy store, they charge merchants an interchange fee for the privilege of riding their networks – card acceptance translates into more business, say the brand owners.

If the settlement is approved, it will see MasterCard and Visa modify their operating rules to permit merchants to charge the consumer more to pay with a card. Merchants will have the right to "surcharge" the use of a card, rather than if you use cash or another payment method.

Where will this lead – it’s complicated. Stay tuned. The National Association of Convenience Stores has announced it has already retained counsel to challenge approval of the proposed settlement. The association says the settlement doesn’t go far enough and, for example, doesn’t put a limit on how high the brand associations can raise the interchange fees charged to merchants. Whether approved or whether the law suit goes forward, or some other settlement is reached – it’s complicated.

So, if you need lawyers to help you navigate the charted and uncharted waters of the financial seas ahead, talk to us. It’s what we do. Contact me, Joseph I. ("Joe") Rosenbaum, or any of the lawyers at Rimon you routinely work with. Our FIG (Financial Industry Group) lawyers are experienced in virtually every aspect of the law or finance, financial institutions and payment systems – from privacy and GLB, to chargebacks and B2B. Call us, you’ll like us.

June 29, 2012

What’s in a (Domain) Name? ICANN by any other name would still…

On June 13, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) revealed the list of applications for new gTLDs to be launched as part of its proposed expansion of the top-level domain space. A total of 1,930 applications were filed for strings, including brand names, generic words and abbreviations, geographic terms, and non-ASCII strings (such as Chinese or Arabic). If this is allowed to move forward as it is currently envisaged, it will be a striking change to the domain name system, with dramatic new risks and evolving threats, as well as opportunities. Brand owners – applicants or not – need to strategize and prepare now, to protect their marks and brands. Some may also need to decide whether or not to challenge any pending applications.

Rimon has assembled a global team of thought-leaders to counsel and guide you. Experienced lawyers who have been following and assisting for years – ever since the proposal was first announced. Rimon is now offering a teleseminar intended to cover:

How to develop a strategy to protect your rights – marks and brands
What brand owners should be thinking about now
Commenting on and objecting to applications
The Trademark Clearinghouse and other supposed protections in the new system
Updates on industry, governmental and regulatory efforts to provide more protection for brands and trademark owners

You can register through the link here: The gTLD Applications Have Been Revealed: What Brand Owners Must Know Going Forward.

As always, if you need legal or regulatory counsel, call me, Joseph I. (“Joe”) Rosenbaum, or any of the lawyers highlighted in the full Client Alert or, of course, the Rimon lawyer with whom you regularly work.

April 2, 2012

Taxing Storm Clouds Gather Over Utah

In June 2010, we announced the launch of an initiative focusing on Cloud Computing (‘Transcending the Cloud’ – Rimon Announces White Paper Series & Legal Initiative on Cloud Computing), showcased with a series of individual and topical white papers, in time being compiled into a comprehensive work entitled, “Transcending the Cloud: A Legal Guide to the Risks and Rewards of Cloud Computing.” One of the first in our series was a paper on the state tax implications of cloud computing, entitled: “Pennies From Heaven”

Just as clouds have different shapes, sizes and shades of gray, different states are approaching taxation of cloud transactions differently. Well now, our State Tax practice reports that taxing storm clouds are gathering over Utah. In a marked about-face from the state’s previously issued guidance, the Utah Sales Tax Commission has ruled that web services that charge a fee constitute sale of a service, subject to sales tax. The implication being that mere access of or to an application is enough to subject the provider to a tax liability.

Notable for cloud computing providers, even though the product at issue was access to remotely hosted software that allowed users to conduct webinars "in the cloud," allowing customers to download a free device application for access to that service had the state seeing "software" (sales of which are subject to sales tax in Utah). With at least one state looking at clouds from the application side now, it will be interesting to see if other states quickly follow.

For more information about the Utah ruling, or to stay on top of the developments in the taxation cloud products and platforms, visit www.taxingtech.com. To get legal assistance and guidance from someone who really knows that state of state taxation of cloud computing, contact Kelley C. Miller directly. Of course, you can always find out more about our Cloud Computing initiative or get the assistance you need by contacting me, Joseph I. ("Joe") Rosenbaum, or the Rimon attorney with whom you regularly work.

September 22, 2011

When Online Games, Health & Life Sciences and Crowd Sourcing Combine

This time, the law of unintended consequences is bringing scientists and online gamers together in a crowd sourcing manner hitherto unimaginable.

An article in this month’s edition of the journal Nature Structural & Molecular Biology has announced (citing both research scientists and online gamers as co-authors of the article) that through a 2008 purpose-oriented video game developed at the University of Washington in 2008 – Foldit – the structure of an enzyme, one used in complicated customizing of retroviruses, was accurately modeled.

Who cares and how does this affect us? Well, as a former biochemist wannabe, if you can model the structure of these proteins, you can better understand how diseases are caused and correspondingly develop drugs to block or stymie the progress of those diseases.

Amazingly, gamers were able to produce an accurate model of an enzyme whose structure had eluded scientists for a very long time in only three weeks and the report notes, referring specifically to medication against the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) for which an understanding and design of antiretroviral drugs is absolutely critical. Seth Cooper, one of the creators of Foldit noted that "Games provide a framework for bringing together the strengths of computers and humans. The results in this week’s paper show that gaming, science and computation can be combined to make advances that were not possible before."

If you thought the intellectual property, licensing, user generated content, crowd sourcing, cloud sourcing, social media legal issues were already enough arising from scientific research, online gaming and crowd sourcing alone were enough to make your head spin, conjure up the implications when the term ‘convergence’ is applied to any two or three of these disciplines. Isn’t it time you had legal counsel and representation who can seamlessly help navigate them while your teams are busy solving the health care and medical problems of the world?

If you want to know more about how lawyers who understand can help your business, feel free to contact me, Joe Rosenbaum, or any of the Rimon attorneys with whom you regularly work.

September 1, 2011

BNA Highlights Health IT Issues Raised by Rimon Attorneys

The August 29, 2011 issue of BNA’s Health IT Law & Industry Report (Vol. 3, No. 36), describes some of the major legal and contractual issues raised when health care industry companies and professionals are considering moving to a cloud computing environment. Joseph I. (“Joe”) Rosenbaum was interviewed by the author, Kendra Casey Plank, for her article, entitled, “Attorney: Cloud Services Offer Affordable Solutions but Raise Privacy, Security Risks.” The article not only quotes Rosenbaum extensively, but also refers to Rimon’s White Paper series “Transcending the Cloud: A Legal Guide to the Risks and Rewards of Cloud Computing,” which began in June 2010 (see "Transcending the Cloud" – Rimon Announces White Paper Series & Legal Initiative on Cloud Computing). The series is updated regularly with individual articles on topics ranging from government contracting and state tax, to the most recent White Paper entitled, “Health Care in the Cloud – Think You Are Doing Fine on Cloud Nine? Hey, You! Think Again. Better Get Off of My Cloud,” which Rosenbaum and Rimon Associate Vicky G. Gormanly wrote and which was posted on the Legal Bytes blog August 5, 2001 (Transcending the Cloud – Health Care on Cloud 9? Are You Doing Fine?). What’s the state of your health care compliance? Are you doing fine?

Read the White Paper and, if you have any questions or need help, contact Joe Rosenbaum or Vicky Gormanly, or the Rimon attorney with whom you regularly work.

August 5, 2011

Transcending the Cloud – Health Care on Cloud 9? Are You Doing Fine?

If you are a music aficionado, you will remember that years ago, The Temptations sang “I’m Doing Fine on Cloud Nine.”

https://youtube.com/watch?v=6aiYCuOzmcs

If you are a health care provider paying attention to the buzz about cloud computing, you may be concerned about migrating your technology, your data and your applications to a cloud environment. Or, let’s say you are just confused about the implications. You are not alone.

That’s precisely why our Cloud Computing initiative exists. To provide you with a guidance system – navigational tools to allow you to see sunshine, even on a cloudy day. So, as part of our ongoing commitment to keeping abreast of legal issues, concerns and considerations in the legal world of cloud computing, here, from Vicky G. Gormanly and Joseph I. Rosenbaum, is the next chapter in Rimon’s on-going series, “Transcending the Cloud: A Legal Guide to the Risks and Rewards of Cloud Computing,” entitled “Health Care in the Cloud – Think You Are Doing Fine on Cloud Nine? Hey, You! Think Again. Better Get Off of My Cloud.” This white paper examines the considerations and concerns that arise for the health care industry and the industry’s associated suppliers, vendors and providers in the wake of complex and evolving regulation and scrutiny – most notably, in the privacy and data protection of medical information – of electronic health records.

As we do each time, we have also updated the entire work, so that in addition to the single ‘Health Care in the Cloud’ white paper, you can access and download a PDF of the entire “Transcending the Cloud: A Legal Guide to the Risks and Rewards of Cloud Computing” compendium, up to date and including all the previous chapters in one document. After reading the article, instead of doing fine, you just may want to take the advice of The Rolling Stones and “Get Off of My Cloud” until you consult your legal advisors.

Of course, feel free to contact Vicky Gormanly or Joe Rosenbaum directly if you have any questions or require legal counsel or assistance related to this white paper. Make sure you subscribe via email or get the Legal Bytes RSS feed so you are always in touch with our latest information. Of course, if you ever have questions, you can always contact any Rimon attorney with whom you regularly work.