Legal Current

You can now speed through store checkout lanes just by waving your smartphone.  New mobile payment systems purport to be fast, convenient and secure.  Well, maybe not that last part.  Bob Benjy, an attorney with Frandzel Robins Bloom & Csato, who works with financial institutions, says mobile payment systems such as Apple Pay, Google Wallet and CurrentC may present potentially serious security loopholes.

Meanwhile, the IP & Science business of Thomson Reuters has just issued a patent analysis examining all facets of smartphone security and finds that smartphone manufacturers are dramatically stepping up their global patent filings related to protecting the privacy of cellular callers.

Net neutrality is the principle that Internet service providers and governments should treat all data on the Internet equally, not discriminating or charging differentially by user, content, site, platform, application, type of attached equipment, or mode of communication. Examples of net neutrality violations include when the Internet service provider Comcast intentionally slowed peer-to-peer communications.

On February 26, the FCC ruled in favor of net neutrality by reclassifying broadband access as a telecommunications service and thus applying Title II (common carrier) of the Communications Act of 1934 to Internet service providers.

We spoke with Judge Daniel Brenner, who serves on the Los Angeles County Superior Court, about net neutrality and the legal issues surrounding it. Previously Brenner was a partner in the communications, media and entertainment group of Hogan Lovells US LLP in its Washington and Los Angeles offices. His practice concentrated on matters involving cable operators, programmers, and suppliers with a focus on policy, intellectual property, and regulation before the Federal Communications Commission, the U.S. Copyright Office, and Congress.  Judge Brenner is the author of the book Cable Television and Other Nonbroadcast Video, published by Thomson Reuters.

Welcome to a new edition of Ill Repute, a bi-weekly podcast on reputation and the forces in a 24 hour news cycle and social media that impact it. This week, Susan Martin is joined by colleague in Corporate Affairs, Gretchen DeSutter, as well as resident PR consultant, Leonard Lee. Listen as they discuss ramifications around the Rolling Stone retracted article, "A Rape on Campus," as well as their thoughts on brand management at the 2015 Masters Tournament.

With the Annual Bar Association’s (ABA) Techshow 2015 coming up next week, we talked with WestlawNext-sponsored keynote speaker Nicholas Carr to get a preview on what he will be discussing. In this podcast, Carr also talks with us about the consequences surrounding our dependence on computers, how our relationship with technology has changed the practice of law, and his take on the Right To Be Forgotten.

This episode starts off with a question regarding whether or not any of the guys have any embarrassing photos on the internet. This quickly leads into a conversation about the "Right To Be Forgotten" and whether or not people have a fundamental right to have their mistakes removed (or at least suppressed) from the internet. The guys talk about the expectation of privacy in personal life versus what someone should expect to have happen to them in a public setting; they also talk about whether or not it is disingenuous for a company or hotel to suppress negative reviews from search engines. The conversation evolves into a discussion of ownership of one's face, when consent is not given by one or more parties and the desperate need for the guys to find a lawyer to answer these questions for them.

Tune into the next show (April 24) when we hope to have our first guest.

The second episode of Ill Repute, a podcast about reputation and the forces in the 24 hour news cycle and social media that impact it, is now available. In this episode, Susan Martin talks with Alex Cook, senior communications specialist, and Leonard Lee, Thomson Reuters resident PR consultant. They discuss election year reputation management, Ted Cruz, issuing a public apology and Guiliana Rancic. There's something for everyone!

In light of the controversy surrounding Hillary Clinton using her personal email while Secretary of State, John Martin, head of the Encompass E-Discovery Group with Nelson Mullins, took some time to discuss with us how common it is for private-sector employees to use personal email for work. Is this practice ever sanctioned, or used as a perk? What are the legal implications for the employer and employee?

In this installment of "Wait, What?" your hosts tackle the question of whether technology makes us lazy or not. They cover everything from grocery delivery services to texting at the dinner table. Jason, Rob and Matt spend quite a bit of time in this episode discussing whether people are productive when they work from home and the effects that "work" phones and tablets have on work/life balance. The talk evolves (or maybe devolves) into a discussion of the person who "invented" the wheel and how that may have affected life at home.

Tune into the next show (April 10) when we cover the “right to be forgotten" in cyberspace and what role this may play, going forward.

Also, stick around after the music for yet (another) embarrassing story that Matt shares.

We'd like to keep the show as interactive as possible, so PLEASE send us your feedback, thoughts, and show ideas to [email protected]. Also, you can reach us on Twitter: Matt Angelicola (@MattAngelicola), Joe Harris (@Jwh37), Rob Russell (@batogato), Jason Thomas (@jasonthomas) and Susan Martin (@soozymartin)

Integrated Corporate Reporting

Robert G. Eccles is a professor of Management Practice at Harvard Business School.  He is one of the world’s leading experts on a global movement for companies to include new, value-related information in their regular reporting to regulators, investors and stakeholders. 

Prof. Eccles has written two books on the subject, One Report: Integrated Reporting for a Sustainable Strategy  and The Integrated Reporting Movement. He is a member of the International Integrated Reporting Council (http://www.integratedreporting.org/) and the founding Chairman of the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) (www.sasb.org). Dr. Eccles is the co-founder, with Professor George Serafeim of Harvard Business School, of the Innovating for Sustainability social movement (https://www.facebook.com/innovatingforsustainability), and a member of the Advisory Board of the Institute for Sustainable Value Creation (https://www.conference-board.org).

Tim Nixon, managing editor of the Sustainability blog at Thomson Reuters interviewed Prof. Eccles on the benefits of integrated reporting and why corporations are moving in that direction.

At Legaltech New York this year, we caught up with Pauline Reich, JD, and Professor of Law at Waseda University School of Law in Tokyo, Japan, where she teaches cyberlaw, e-commerce and Internet-based legal research. In this capacity and also as the director of the Asia-Pacific Cyberlaw, Cybercrime and Internet Security Research Institute at Waseda, Reich tracks global laws and issues of cybersecurity on a daily basis. We had an opportunity to talk about cybersecurity, and her treatise for United States attorneys called Cybercrime & Security, which she also incorporates commentary and advice from expert attorneys, judges, police, and cybersecurity professionals. Click below to listen to the podcast.