A U.S. court has decided that a bank whose client lost money because someone hacked into its account and transferred funds out of it, was not liable to the client because the bank had used ‘commercially reasonable’ security. The case is described on the Goodwin Proctor website. The lengthy decision of the Judge Magistrate in Patco Construction v People’s Bank, later upheld, is available online. .

Is this the right standard of care for negligence? Does it matter that the bank is regulated strictly under the Bank Act? Does it matter that the U.S. bank could . . . [more]

If you’re interested in defamation law you’d do well to read the recently published piece by Bob Tarantino, “Chasing Reputation: The Argument for Differential Treatment of “Public Figures” in Canadian Defamation Law,” (2010) 48 Osgoode Hall Law Journal 595 [PDF]. The author, a partner at Heenan Blaikie and a blogger at their Entertainment and Media Law Signal argues for the:

recasting the tort of defamation into two different tracks: one for public figures, who pose the highest risk of abusing the tort, and one for private plaintiffs, whose reputational interest is akin to traditional notions of reputation.

This . . . [more]

I have this dream—a nightmare really—like one of those dreams where you’re trapped in an embarrassing or compromising position. In this dream, I walk into my law firm’s library and the shelves and books are gone. Instead, I see rows of keyboards and gleaming cathode ray tubes. The computers have staged a coup d’état.

Scott Stolley, The Corruption of Legal Research, For the Defense (Apr. 2004).

The promise and scope of Big Data is that within all that data lies the answer to just about everything.

Vivek Ranadivé, Chairman and CEO, Tibco, from Crunching Big Data: more than a

Happy belated Labour Day! With Thanksgiving just around the corner, it is good to review the labour standards applicable to statutory general holidays like Labour day and Thanksigiving day (which will fall on October 10, 2011 this year) for the province of Québec. I have no doubt that there are many Québec-based readers on Slaw.

Although many people actually benefit from a paid day off on these holidays, the Québec Act respecting Labour Standards explicitly sets out the conditions surrounding those payments and what happens when you’re required to work on a statutory holiday or how you’re paid if you’re . . . [more]

The number of law firms to engage in legal process outsourcing (LPO) is still relatively low but is growing. In a recent survey by Legal Week, 15% of law firms said they use LPO services, with half believing that number would grow over the next year.

But while law firms weigh up their options, numerous corporations (including some of the largest global corporations) have clearly moved ahead by entering into their own LPO arrangements.

UK construction giant Carillion, employing 50,000 staff and with an annual revenue of around £5bn, has entered into a relationship with a UK LPO provider to . . . [more]

This is an interesting addendum to the ABA session ““Friend” Is Now a Verb: Judicial Ethics and the New Social Media“. In the Financial Post‘s Legal Post section from August 2nd, Mitch Kowalski notes Oklahoma’s Judicial Ethics Advisory Panel released an opinion on judges and social media in that state on July 6, 2011. The Oklahoma State Courts Network (OSCN.net) has the full Judicial Ethics Opinion 2011-3.

From the opinion:

¶1 Questions: 1. May a Judge hold an internet social account, such as Facebook, Twitter, or Linkedin without violating the Code of Judicial Conduct?

¶2 2.

As we often do here on Slaw, we’re drawing your attention to the current Google Doodle, in this case an animation to honour Queen’s marvelous Freddie Mercury (1946-1991), whose birthday is Monday, September 5. The screenshot below shows only one moment of a longish Flash movie that accompanies Queen’s “Don’t Stop Me Now.”

Google tells us that it won’t be seen in the US until a day later, September 6, because of Labour Day. (Er… Canada too.) But that indignity to Freddie is no impediment: Check it out on the UK Google site for the next few hours at least: . . . [more]

This past week the Ontario Superior Court released the decision in Baglow v. Smith, where the plaintiff’s claim over an allegedly defamatory blog post was dismissed on summary judgment. The decision is also of interest for Judge Peter Annis’ discussion on how to “remove the sting” of internet postings, and the application of the fair comment defence. Matthew Nied has also posted a more concise summary of the case on his site.

Background

The plaintiff, John Baglow, is relatively renowned in Canadian political circles and operated under the moniker of “Dr. Dawg” on Dawg’s Blog. He describes . . . [more]

For the last few days this video of two robots having a conversation has been making the rounds. It is fascinating, and hilarious. The Cornell Creative Machines Lab also has other fascinating videos of robots at work. There has not been much in the way of interesting comment on the video, but Kevin Kelly actually called the grad students involved to find out a little more. It is a pretty good take on the Turing Test. . . . [more]

On September 15, two legislative research experts will help to uncover the hidden gems in Ontario and federal legislation.

Caroline Hyslop is no stranger to CALL – some of you may have already attended great presentations she has given in the past. And I may be a little biased because I work with him, but Rick Sage is both an engaging speaker and experienced e-Laws spelunker.

This is the second in CALL’s 2011-12 series of webinars. More information is available at the CALL website. (Online registration available!) . . . [more]

As the great Oscar once wrote, “I always pass on good advice. It is the only thing to do with it. It is never of any use to oneself.” So here I am, passing upon advice, admittedly not quite the same thing. And let me say at the outset that since advice is something lawyers give, or, rather, sell, I find it good.

Of course, lawyers aren’t the only ones charging for advice (which, curiously, is rooted in the Latin for “seeing” — as in “the way in which a matter is looked at.” [OED]). Lucy famously charged a . . . [more]

Everybody wants something for free. It’s human nature. And it’s rarely more prevalent than when it comes to technology. “It’s all just bits and bytes, why should it cost anything?” says one. “Information wants to be free” suggests another. 

Today’s generations have grown up in the age of Napster and Google and surveys indicate that there is almost an expectation that digital content, including music and movies, is free. Much to the chagrin of the entertainment industry who has been battling since the invention of the tape recorder and VCR to figure out how to keep making money off a . . . [more]