Legality Issues?

[BASHERS33]

I am making simple modifications for Invision's forum software. One of them has a section to it where people with permissions can download files. What deos someone do in this type of situation to avoid any legality issues? Someone told me that you can never promise 100% security on something like that. So what if someone decides to use that portion to sell files and they find out a hacker somehow got access? What do I do to make sure I would not run into any legal issues with that? It's starting to make me wonder if there's even a point to making forum software addons because it's meant to be simple things and it's not going to get tond of money for me and then who knows if I could then be sued over something even if i include a warning about nothing being truly secure online.

[WingedPanther]

You'll probably want to talk with a lawyer to craft a standard disclaimer.

[Natrobius]

Yes.... A disclaimer of liability is what you need. Try something like legalzoom.com and see if they have anything.

[jwxie518]

From my experience, in reality, a disclaimer does not work. It gives you the most basic "protection", but in the end, from most cases (because the site i work with is primarily for finding sources and download). We always receive complains from attorneys. We are just lucky that we can make compromise with them.
Remember, it is your management fault not to regulate the site and end up with pirates.
Also, speak with your hosting provider. Many hosting providers will terminate your account without first issue you if they find your involve with piratey.

[BASHERS33]

I'm not talking about pirating. This is a forum modification I was going to sell which has a component to it which allows people to sell or give away files. Just a standard download script with some unique features I thought of. But people tell me that no matter what lengths I go to to secure it some chance is always going to be there that someone could find a way to download files they have not paid for. (and by the way the paying is done OUTSIDE of my program. it is not going to have any transactions involving money done through it... that would be done independantly somewhere such as paypal).

If someone sells something and finds out someone found a way to download it for free, I should not be responsible and be able to be sued because a hacker figured a way around things. Hackers find ways to hack practically anything.

But pirating is yet another thing to worry about. A site owner can't be expected to know what is pirated and what isn't. And I sure shouldn't be held responsible if someone who buys my SOFTWARE uses it for that as i have no control over what they use it for.

So a disclaimer when using it... telling people not to upload pirated software is one thing. But I'm talking about how to protect myself in case someone uses it and loses profits due to someone hackign their way through the system and taking files theyw ere supposed to pay for. Although I doubt that would be possible if they store the files in a non-web-accessible place.

So basically apparently people are saying there's no point in being a programmer if you don't work under someone in a company? Why would I want to keep making programs for forums if I could be sued over it? It makes me feel like I wasted my time even making anything and should not sell anything. ANY script can be abused or have some shot at having somethign exploitable in the future as people figure out new ways to do things. So everyone who programs should be sued?

This is for forums and I see countless download scripts released for them. I just don't see how it's worth anyone releasing anything at all if they can be sued if something happens and online something WILL happen no matter what.

[jwxie518]

Well if you are talking about your script, I don't see any reason why you should be sue. I thought you said you want to have your own site, run your script and let people download the file via payment.

Simply put, sites like sendspace and megaupload have been sued and compromised numerous time. They have report system so their staff would take action immediately. This is why the site did not get sue because they can do a compromise.

In the case which site owner gets sues is because they ignore the complain and blatantly encourage the activities.

It is quite interesting. Our site is one of the biggest enemy of the HK TVB Cop and so far we are still on top of the case. They are still unable to sue us, for recording their productions (drama, shows, etc) and upload them to be share freely. We did not earn any profit except for the ads (google ads). But the problem is probably because HK law is still very week in turning down the piracy.

But as far as I know, since I did a lot of research in the past (class assignment and helping other people), in case of P2P technology (aside from the Pirate Bay case), we had a few cases in HK which distributer and receivers got sued.

One way they determine in HK is the amount of distribution and amount of loss (in terms of profit). If one abuses the P2P technology, they can be sue like this:

making / processing / distributing pirate products:
(f) even if the purpose has no connection with any business circumstance, once the distribution reaches a meaningful harm or loss to the owner can be sue for that reason


Simply put, I can share my CD (I brought it) and share it to my friend via P2P technology. I can post a link on this board and others can re-distrubte the linke throughout the WWW and in a few days, it is possible that the download count can reach to 100000 hits. this is a great loss.

There is a calculation on this but I don't remember.

But is this a valid and strong argument? It is certainly not a strong reason to charge but the attorney can find other evidences to prove that you, the distributer, know the risk and know what you do is piracy.

This is why, it is very very hard to charge someone for piracy on the Internet. It is extremely hard.
By the way, there is piracy laws from the International Court.
One last thing, I know I am getting away from the topic. People like to host their web service outside their own countries so they don;t get sue easily. USA is one great place, I am dead serious. 3 reasons: it is outside the site owner's country so it is hard to investigate and charge; two, it is easy to get a web service here; and three, it is easier to get away from the charge here in USA.

[BASHERS33]

Well in my case I only want to sell my program I made so I definitely won't be pirating. Maybe I would just make it where my members can't upload files and only I can...

What's funny is I am going to sell my program THROUGH itself. lol So they pay to download the program FROM the program on my site itself.

But anyway see I don't see why I should be held liable whatsoever if other people pirate things and I do not know it. I can't magically know what people are uploading every second of the day.

See what I am most worried about though is some people may only have access to a public root. They may not have access to the home root above the public root. So in their case it would be easier for hackers to take their files they put up for download. So i am worried they would then blame me for someone hacking into the directory and getting their files.

But there is nothing else I can do. I am using readfile() in php and so it hides the path. I have index.html files in directories. I recommend they put it in a non-public directory. I don't see anything else I could do to keep someone from finding a way to download the files without permission. So I would think I couldn't be sued. But someone can probably sue no matter what and then me have to go to court even if their claim is a lie. So it makes me wonder how I can even be sure I am safe from it. Me getting a few hundred dollars for selling this (I doubt many will buy it anyway) wouldn't be worth being sued.