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Spyware

What the law says

SpywareSpyware is on every legislator’s hit list. Several US states have enacted anti-spyware legislation but currently, without being creative and applying anti-hacking laws to spyware, there are no US federal laws. Utah’s law is currently under attack in the courts, whilst New York and California are expected to adopt their own versions of anti-spyware laws, as are other US states. Internationally, laws have been and will continue to be enacted.

Some of the laws can be problematic. They have too broad a reach, and can affect parental control software that includes a monitoring component. It is very important that any laws in this area are carefully crafted both to include future spyware and to exclude parental and business monitoring applications.

Further information

Once the dust settles, we will post links to the major laws in this area. meanwhile, we have provided a selection of informative links to external Web sites:

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