On Fri, 23 Feb 2001, David Sharp wrote:
I've been writing the bit of the user file where I commit myself to
total confidentiality of the member data - to keep it completely
confidential and on no account to provide any of it to any third
party whatsoever.
I've asked the hosting service to provide me with such a commitment,
but I'd be interested in knowing whether there are any kind of
accepted ground rules for this kind of situation.
Without a legally binding contract I would think your position is pretty
tenuous, although I'm not a lawyer and I'm not pretending to be one. I
am not aware of any "accepted ground rules" but I'll tell you what we
do, and then give you a worst case scenario to be paranoid about. :-)
We commit, in writing, that a customer's list of subscribers and the
messages belong to them, and we'll make every reasonable effort to keep
it that way. We will also ensure they "get it back" should they decide
at some point in the future to change service providers. However, there
are three caveats.
1. Your account has to be in good standing. If you're in arrears all
bets are off.
2. We will cooperate with any legal request from any court of competent
jurisdiction (or whatever the legal phrase is that means if we get a
valid subpeona we're going to give it up).
3. We are not responsible for acts of God, etc.
This is all well and good and I'm sure that like us most companies who
would make such a statement really do plan to stick to it. The scenario
to be concerned about though is what happens if and when the company
"sells out." If you've signed a legal agreement you're probably in
pretty good shape but I would recommend being wary if you're going to
make decisions based on a "published privacy policy." The latter can be
changed in one click and frequently is when larger companies buy up
smaller ones.
Jim
--
James M. Galvin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
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