IT & SOFTWARE LAW

This area includes legal advising in connection with internet law, e-commerce and software law.

Internet law is a generic term for all legal matters related to the internet. It covers all fall legal questions on national and international domain issues, copyright issues, media law, unfair competition act (UWG), trade law, EC free movement of goods and freedom to provide services, tax law questions on VAT-handling and taxability according to the double taxation agreement.

E-commerce requires extensive knowledge of logistic transactions from the purchase order to the payment and the returns. General civil law and in particular consumer protection laws play an important role. E-commerce transactions need to be structured efficiently and clearly. E-commerce includes also legal issues related to marketing activities, such as cookies, data protection, email and SMS advertising, the use of intelligent agents and many more.

Software Law includes programming of software, with performance booklets, testing, support, copyright issues, licensing, open source, usually in conjunction with specific legal requirements of the industry of the client.

Selected reference cases:

• domain - grabbing disputes before state courts and the .eu court of arbitration,
• spamming prosecution,
• advising of e-commerce platforms,
• copyright enforcement (software theft, thumb-nails, usage of texts),
• performance right disputes,
• software contracts (service obligations, support, maintenance, data export),
• development and compensation disputes,
• software terms of use,
• cooperation and sale of software development,
• sales and rental of internet lines,
• general conditions for internet providers and data centres,
• general conditions for software maintenance companies and IT service providers of all kinds.