is it illegal? ive seen sites that rip TOS and privacy policies. can anything be done legally if this happens?

Without permission, sure it's illegal. Copying anyone's work is illegal.

Some hosts are open to sharing their privacy policy and ToS. I saw a thread not long ago where some hosts said an induvidual was free to copy these. Without permission it is copyright infringment like anything else you copy.

Originally posted by dbodner
Without permission, sure it's illegal. Copying anyone's work is illegal.

copying may be looked down upon, however that does not automatically make it against the law. for example, if i were to copy a sentence from ur site, would that be illegal?

could u even come up with vaild evidence supporting ur claim?


so techincally speaking, if a TOS is not copyrighted, its fair game. any lawyers here, id like to know their opinion.

For the most part, the answer is NO.

By definition a TOS or AUP is (or should be), quoting the Legal Laws of their Country, how they apply to that Web site in particular, and will be enforced by the Web site stating them. These laws are Freely and Publicly available to anyone. Even the wording can be verbatim as that is the way Laws of the Land should be quoted. The problem comes in when people erroneously copy laws that do not apply to them or where they live.

I would suppose there is room for structure or styling of the wording and definitions being applied, but for the most, they should both be considered to be a Legal Document and treated as such.

A Privacy Policy is a bit different as that is mostly opinions or policy of the individual Web site. Although these too, are somewhat of a "form" in outline and particulars ( see http://truste.com/ for example ) it is a good thing, if people learn what should be in a Privacy Policy, apply their own standards and procedures, then put it all together in something they are willing to stand behind.

One must also remember that any Web Page (also known as a document), available to the public is, by defintion of most Countries, Copyrighted by the author, or Web site, and cannot be copied by someone else; at least, not verbatim for the whole page.

so in a nutshell, u have no case against someone if they copy ur TOS

I think in a nutshell, you have to pick your battles, and I personally just wouldn't worry about people copying your TOS. No one reads it anyway, heh, so for copied skim material, I'd try to sell a package in the time it takes you to get all worked up about it, email them, fight up and back, etc.

Not quite. If you quote (and someone copies) wording of legal statute for wherever you happen to be, or boilerplate-type paragraphs ("user agress to hold harmless and indemnify...") there is nothing wrong with that, and nothing you can do. If someone copies something that you have authored yourself, external to anything put together by legislative authority or freely available as legal reference, and uses it without your permission, you are justified in asking/telling them to remove it. TOS/AUPs are not generally worth it. Privacy policies, OTOH, are usually styled for the host themselves, as Rob points out, and are more apt to be readily identifiable as being lifted material - something that would warrant a removal request should you be inclined.

Originally posted by Chicken
I think in a nutshell, you have to pick your battles, and I personally just wouldn't worry about people copying your TOS. No one reads it anyway, heh, so for copied skim material, I'd try to sell a package in the time it takes you to get all worked up about it, email them, fight up and back, etc.

haha. no way im gona take someone to court over copying a TOS. i guess i gave off the impression that i was talking about a reallife situation. this is strictly hypothetical.

Originally posted by Website Rob
By definition a TOS or AUP is (or should be), quoting the Legal Laws of their Country, how they apply to that Web site in particular, and will be enforced by the Web site stating them. These laws are Freely and Publicly available to anyone. Even the wording can be verbatim as that is the way Laws of the Land should be quoted. I'd say you would have a hard time finding much language in any such policy that appears in any law or statute. On the other hand, much of it is boilerplate legal language to which no one owns copyright.

much of it is boilerplate legal language to which no one owns copyright
Agreed.

Boilerplate Legal language or "legalese" for short, is probably better than using "Laws of the Land".


I would disagree with:

rlynch: so in a nutshell, u have no case against someone if they copy ur TOS
Odds are, two Lawyers using the same applicable Laws should come out with almost the same thing when covering the same points.
Only their price will be different. ;)

Chicken: No one reads it anyway
You need to brush up on "why" Legal Documents are made available. To not have them available is one thing, to not have them "at all" is totally different and puts the Site owner/business at risk. They are made available for protection and clarification (remember, no ambuguity) and, whether anyone reads them or not -- is beside the point.

Originally posted by Website Rob
You need to brush up on "why" Legal Documents are made available. ...whether anyone reads them or not -- is beside the point.
No brushing up needed. While 'whether anyone reads them or not' is besides the point (I'll give you that one), so is having or not having them at all and putting the Site owner/business at risk. That wasn't the question. Note, I was answering the question above.

I disagree with Website Rob - For the most part, the answer is NO.

By definition a TOS or AUP is (or should be), quoting the Legal Laws of their Country, how they apply to that Web site in particular, and will be enforced by the Web site stating them. These laws are Freely and Publicly available to anyone.

You could lift any 'verbatim' quotes of legal statutes, but these agreements are never just a compilation of quotes from published law.

The preceding paragraph which I just wrote is instantly copywrited. The only thing that can abrogate my rights to that paragraph is if the WHT site has as part of its terms of use a disclaimer that writers give up all ownership of content they contribute. (I have not checked this on WHT because I do not care.)

A person or lawyer (two different things? you be the judge ;) ) who crafts an agreement is doing far more than simply cutting and pasting text from a countries civil code. Their work effort is protected by the same copyright law that protects any author.

Originally posted by Website Rob

I would disagree with:

rlynch: so in a nutshell, u have no case against someone if they copy ur TOS
Odds are, two Lawyers using the same applicable Laws should come out with almost the same thing when covering the same points.
Only their price will be different. ;)


what u just said has nothing to do with my hypothesis.

Which is true. Too early in the morning I guess.

Should have quoted what I originally had said:
One must also remember that any Web Page (also known as a document), available to the public is, by defintion of most Countries, Copyrighted by the author, or Web site, and cannot be copied by someone else; at least, not verbatim for the whole page.

Just a nice and simple thought...

All commercial websites are required to have a TOS, Privacy Policy and they all should follow some rules, in order to have the terms on the site.....

Just an example, you can not make a TOS saying "so and so has right to spam the hell out of you, and you can not remove yourself from the list, no matter what"

So IMHO, all terms of service and privacy policies have same rules than any other site.

Whats the difference if a site has in their TOS "We will not sell your personal information" and other site's "We worry about your personal information as much as our's"?

I personally think that copying and pasting a law from one site to other can not be illigal.

But then again........ I am not a lawyer :D

actually, websites DO have the right to say "so and so has right to spam the hell out of you, and you can not remove yourself from the list, no matter what" it may not be a wise business move, but it isnt illegal. its ur decision if u want to use their site or not.

Originally posted by rlynch
actually, websites DO have the right to say "so and so has right to spam the hell out of you, and you can not remove yourself from the list, no matter what" it may not be a wise business move, but it isnt illegal. its ur decision if u want to use their site or not.

With all due respact, I do not know what 3rd world country you live in, but if you have a site in U.S and do not remove the person after him or her requesting to delete from the list, gov can ban either your site, business or servers that you use for hosting, I believe most Europe countries follow same internet laws there too.

Site from outside of U.S usually get banned by the gov, so no user from U.S can go to that site.

You can find more information about that at FBI and other Gov. related websites.

Originally posted by Mesum


With all due respact, I do not know what 3rd world country you live in, but if you have a site in U.S and do not remove the person after him or her requesting to delete from the list, gov can ban either your site, business or servers that you use for hosting, I believe most Europe countries follow same internet laws there too.

Site from outside of U.S usually get banned by the gov, so no user from U.S can go to that site.

You can find more information about that at FBI and other Gov. related websites.

misread ur quote, didnt read the part that said "no matter what"

they do have the rigth to spam u however. taht is of course if u agree to their TOS.

Originally posted by Mesum
With all due respact, I do not know what 3rd world country you live in, but if you have a site in U.S and do not remove the person after him or her requesting to delete from the list, gov can ban either your site, business or servers that you use for hosting,

That is absolutely untrue. There are certain states that have anti-spam laws, but there is nothing on the federal level - certainly nothing that would allow the government to come shut you down.

-Bob

Ok, I think you guys win, I tell you what, let me give you few URLs for you guys to check out and see how much feds are involve in this multi-billion dollars world.

http://www.ftc.gov/privacy/index.html
http://www.fbi.gov/congress/congress00/kerr072400.htm
http://www.tigerden.com/junkmail/laws.html
http://www.spamlaws.com/federal/index.html
http://www.jmls.edu/cyber/cases/spam.html
http://www.quantumbizweb.com/en-us/pg_48.html

I think these sould open few people's eyes who think they could get away with spam...

Originally posted by Mesum
I think these sould open few people's eyes who think they could get away with spam...

There's lots of proposed/pending legislation, but nothing that's been passed yet on a federal level. The state laws, while brought about by the best of intentions, really have no teeth.

That's not to say that companies can't bring suit against spammers privately - they can, just as AOL and others have done. It is, however, an expensive and time-consumong proposition, which it why it happens so infrequently.

-Bob