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An Analysis Of Email Disclaimers

Posted by timothy on from the by-reading-this-you-agree-to-send-your-sister dept.

akintayo writes "Recently more amd more organisations have required email sent from their accounts to contain an attached disclaimer. This disclaimer is supposed to describe the recipient's rights to 'use' that email. This slate article analyzes the legality and impact of one such disclaimer, and finds it somewhat lacking."

4 of 334 comments (clear)

  1. Limit this crap to four lines... by garcia · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I consider a 100+ word message at the bottom of an email spam. Most emails are a sentence or two. What the hell do I need another 100+ words tacked on the end for? Shouldn't we have some sort of mandate similar to Usenet signatures? That said...

    It may be legally privileged and/or confidential and is intended only for the use of the addressee(s).

    If the reader of this message is not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any unauthorized disclosure, dissemination, distribution, copying or the taking of any action in reliance on the information herein is strictly prohibited.

    If you have received this communication in error, please immediately notify the sender and delete this message.

    Now, while the lawyer notes that they are only asking you to do these things I see another flaw... If the document wasn't intended for the use by the addressee the rest of the notice is moot. It's up to the sender to guarantee that the message is delivered to the correct John.Doe@yahoo.com. I don't see how I would have to follow any of that if a) I didn't sign it and b) I am not the person they intended anyway.

    No addressee should forward, print, copy, or otherwise reproduce this message in any manner that would allow it to be viewed by any individual not originally listed as a recipient.

    If I am sent it incorrectly I am not allowed to look at it anyway. It doesn't make sense.

    Then again IANAL :)

  2. Mail User License Agreement by Clinoti · · Score: 5, Interesting
    There is also the fine line between culpability and fair use once the message is out in the fields, unless the sending method is sent by a secured source to a trusted source, the email is free and wild. With the amount of sniffing and man in the middle attacks primed and waiting in the background on the internet it would be foolish to think otherwise.

    One of the reasons a lot of companies automatically put the disclaimers / nonsense on the bottom of the email is that it provides them with somewhat of a means of liability protection from information that was sent or processed from their systems, lets not also forget the confidentiality or rather the breaches of, that email allow to happen so frequently and readily.

    Lastly, later if heaven forbid (!) a scandal hits the office involving a lower or sometimes high level employee, emails (which like any segment of a well defined network) may be called up from archives for an investigation internally or externally in a court of law. Stating the MULA on the bottom of correspondence, while generally accepted in people_to_people terms as fodder, is actually a wise move for a corporation to show its partners, employees, and potential revenue sources the fact that they place internal memos and all communications in the same manner that they would (as any entity with a sense of self preservation) deem a legal document.

    --

    Let's keep in mind that patents are in place to keep lawyers employed and keep them litigating. -CatGrep

  3. If you have received this message in error... by ebh · · Score: 5, Interesting

    ...then I will consider it an unsolicited gift from you, with which I will do whatever I want.

    IOW, tacking a too-bad-if-you-looked legal threat to the end of your email does not establish any sort of contract between us.

  4. HIPAA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I've seen this mostly as a way to comply with HIPAA. HIPAA, governing confidentiality of medical information, doesn't mean you actually have to be secure, just that you have to take reasonable security measures. Many nonprofits have taken this to mean they can send whatever they want via e-mail as long as they tack a disclaimer onto the end. Of course, it's completely ridiculous, but everyone else is doing it, so why shouldn't we jump off that cliff too?