mobile – Duane Morris TechLaw

July 9, 2013July 18, 2016 by Eric J. Sinrod

COPPA Now Includes Greater Protections For Kids Online

Last week, you were informed about the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) updating advertising disclosure guidance for search engines. But there’s more! On July 1, new FTC rules went into effect that are intended to provide greater privacy protection for children online. Indeed, the rules are supposed to afford increased safeguards when it comes to data such as geo-location and social media information.

By way of background, the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) became operative in 2000, in the early days of the commercial Internet. The law was designed to enable parents to control personal information collected from these young children in hopes that COPPA would prevent children under the age of 13 from being targeted via personalized online marketing messages.

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April 2, 2013July 18, 2016 by Eric J. Sinrod

Apps Gone Wild: Is There Anything They Can’t Do?

Once upon a time, I was known as Inspector Gadget. Why? Because I wore on my belt three different devices — a mobile phone, an iPod, and a Palm Pilot. The phone was only good for calls, the iPod could only play music, and the non-wireless Palm Pilot was simply a calendaring assistant.

I wondered then whether there could ever be convergence, such that at some point I only would need to carry around one device. Of course, that did happen, but the convergence occurred beyond my wildest dreams.

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March 19, 2013July 18, 2016 by Eric J. Sinrod

FTC Issues New Advertising Guidelines For The Mobile Age

It has been ages in Internet time since the FTC provided advertising guidance in its “Dot Com Disclosures” release in 2000. Thirteen years later, cyber eons really, the FTC now has come up with new guidance in its “.com Disclosures: How to Make Effective Disclosures in Digital Advertising.”

This new guidance recognizes the exponentially increasing use of mobile devices and the consequences of their limited screen size, as well as the growing prevalence of social media advertising.

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January 28, 2013September 12, 2014 by Duane Morris

Want to “Unlock” That New Mobile Phone? The Rules Have Changed.

It’s a little-known fact that the Librarian of Congress has the power to determine if you can “unlock” your mobile phone/PDA in order to change the telephone/ISP service accessible on the device. You might not think a librarian could be that powerful, but it’s the law.

Learn more about the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DCMA) and the Librarian of Congress’ role in unlocking mobile phones in this blog entry from partner Mark Fischer on the New Media and Entertainment Law Blog.

August 29, 2012July 18, 2016 by Eric J. Sinrod

Prince Harry Learns A Las Vegas Lesson

Dude, where are my clothes? Those might have been the words of Prince Harry when he learned that photos of him naked, but covering his royal private parts, had gone viral worldwide.

How did this happen? Apparently, his royal nakedness was partying in Las Vegas when someone snapped cellphone shots of him in the aftermath of a strip billiards game that then ended up on TMZ.com.

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December 14, 2011July 19, 2016 by Eric J. Sinrod

The Truth About Teen Cell Phone Use

Most of us have heard about sexting — the practice of people sharing naked pictures of themselves online. Indeed, there have been press reports that suggest texting has become the latest teenage craze. Fact or fiction? Perhaps a bit of both.

Recent studies by the journal Pediatrics show that 1% of children between the ages of 10 to 17 have engaged in sexting. About the same percentage have shared less explicit but still suggestive photos of themselves. And 7% report that they had been the recipient of either type of photo.

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