# A California school, Santa Rosa Junior College, has paid three
students $15,000 each in settlement of charges stemming from its
men-only and women-only computer conferences. Last June, the Department
of Education's Office for Civil Rights advised the school
that it had found a probable violation of Federal law prohibiting sex
discrimination in schools. Two female plaintiffs allegedly were the
subject of anatomically explicit and derogatory remarks in the men-only
conference. The third plaintiff, a male, saw the computer
messages and broke the system's confidentiality rule to tell the women.
He claimed the school retaliated against him. The creation of the
segregated conferences was found by the Office of Civil Rights to be
discriminatory in itself, and the remarks were said to be a
form of hostile environment that had created a hostile environment for
one of the women. The Office of Civil Rights has proposed a ban on
computer bulletin board comments that harass, denigrate or show
hostility toward a person or group based on sex, race or color,
including slurs, negative stereotypes, jokes or pranks. (New York Times,
September 22, 1994, A1; San Jose Mercury News, September 17, 1994, 1A.)
# A closely-guarded trade secret of RSA Data Security Inc., known as
RC4, was sent from a computer in the Netherlands running an anonymous
remailer program to a computer mailing list of computer researchers who
oppose stringent Government control on data
encryption. RC4 is the de facto coding standard for many popular
software programs and is the only software-based formula that the
National Security Agency will permit to be easily exported. (New York
Times, September 17, 1994, p.17.)
# The operator of a computer bulletin board known as Davy Jones' Locker,
Richard Kenadek of Millbury, Massachusetts, was arrested on charges of
illegally distributing copyrighted software to paying subscribers.
Kenadek faces up to six years in prison and fines of
$270,000. (San Jose Mercury News, September 1, 1994, 3E.)
# Five men from Louisiana and one from New York were charged with using
computers to gain access to credit-reporting service computers and steal
credit card numbers. The numbers were allegedly used to buy $210,000 in
coins and high-tech hardware. They were
charged with conspiracy, computer fraud, access device fraud and wire
fraud. One of the men faces up to 50 years in prison and $2.25 million
in fines. The others faces lesser sentences and fines. (San Jose Mercury
News, September 8, 1994, 2E.)
# A federal court stopped a promotion on America Online after the
Federal Trade Commission filed a complaint for false advertising,
relating to the promotion of a credit-repair program. The FTC charged
the promotion claimed to provide legal ways to repair credit, while
suggesting illegal steps. The advertiser, Brian Corazine (doing business
as Chase Consulting), agreed to refrain from further advertising and to
inform potential clients that many of the activities suggested in the
$99 program could be illegal. (San Jose Mercury News,
September 15, 1994, 2C, and September 17, 1994, 11D.)
# The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals rejected Apple Computer's appeal in
its $5.5 billion copyright suit against Microsoft Corp. and
Hewlett-Packard Co. The Ninth Circuit sent the case back to the lower
court with instructions for the judge to reconsider rejection of
Microsoft's and H-P's request for attorneys' fees. (San Jose Mercury
News, September 20, 1994, 3E.)
# Apple Computer, Inc. confirmed it will license its Macintosh System
7.5 operating system to other personal computer makers. (New York Times,
September 17, 1994, p.19.)
# Despite assurances that China's security agents are not censoring or
monitoring pager messages, an elite task force of 100 was sent by
Beijing police in response to a beeper message that read, "Please send
20 guys with knives and guns to Dabeiyao." It was sent
by a person testing his new beeper by sending a message to himself. (San
Jose Mercury News, September 20, 1994, 5F.)
# Nintendo of America filed suit against the Taiwan Semiconductor
Manufacturing Co. Ltd., Taiwan's largest semiconductor maker, and its
San Jose, CA, subsidiary, for creating counterfeit chips for the 16-bit
Super Nintendo system and its Asian counterpart, the Super
Famicon. (San Jose Mercury News, September 14, 1994, 1D.)
CyberLex (tm) is published solely as an educational service. The author,
a California attorney, is Executive Editor of LEXIS COUNSEL CONNECT
CALIFORNIA. He may be contacted at jrosen03@reach.com or
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be posted on America Online (go to keyword "CYBERLAW"). Copyright (c)
1994 Jonathan Rosenoer; All Rights Reserved. CyberLex is a trademark of
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