Slashdot Mirror
Is Data Mining for Product Pricing, Illegal?
wessman asks: "I started to read Orin S. Kerr's 80-page paper looking for how his proposal would pertain to: ripping music/movies, P2P, corporate espionage, and lastly, the use of web scraper robots. Little did I know just how relevant his paper would be in regards to that last item! Kerr makes note of EF Cultural Travel v. Explorica in which Explorica is caught hiring a consultant to program a scraping robot to gather pricing information from a competitor, EF Cultural Travel. Well, I do consulting on the side from home and am currently working a project whereby I gather pricing information from all the major travel conglomerates (Orbitz, Expedia, Lodging.com, WorldRes, Sabre, etc.) so that the travel booking business that hired me can meet or beat all their prices. Granted, the circumstances of the Explorica case are different and the case was an example of an extreme ruling, but my questions to the Slashdot community are: Do I notify the company that hired me of the Explorica case? Why is using a scraper robot so different from, say, walking into Best Buy with a handheld and recording product pricing manually? Should I continue with this project and the similar projects I do in this area of programming?" Now, add in the text in the "deliverables" section of this press release and it seems we may have some contradictory information. Who is right, and under what circumstances is price harvesting off of the internet not allowed?
Pricewatch doesnt mine. Companies PAY for the privelege of listing their prices on pricewatch.
Wrong. Read Sam Walton: Made in America: My Story. Sam Walton says that was a story put out by his competitors to disparage his name and he never did anything of the sort.
Read the case...EF Cultural Travel BV v. Explorica hinges on the fact that the defendant company hired an ex-programer from the plaintif company. The programmer had special knowledge of codes used in the pricing (which he had signed a confidentiality agreement not to disclose). When he made the scrapper program he violated the confidentiality agreement.
:) Depending on how the contract is written you could be jointly liable.
It was the violation of the confidentiality agreement that the court held was illegal.
As for whether you should tell your employer, it depends on your employment agreement!
While this is a 1st Circuit case, it has been followed by the 5th Circuit (Ingenix, Inc. v. Lagalante) and cited in cases in the 7th and 9th Circuit.
Hope this helps.
--me