March 19, 2024

Archives for August 2010

A Software License Agreement Takes it On the Chin

[Update: This post was featured on Slashdot.]

[Update: There are two discrete ways of asking whether a court decision is “correct.” The first is to ask: is the law being applied the same way here as it has been applied in other cases? We can call this first question the “legal question.” The second is to ask: what is the relevant social or policy goal from a normative standpoint (say, technological progress) and does the court decision advance that goal? We can call this second question “the policy question.” Eric Felten, who addressed my August 31st post at length in his article in the Wall Street Journal (Video Game Tort: You Made Me Play You), is clearly addressing the policy question. He describes “[t]he proliferation of annoying and obnoxious license agreements” as having great social utility because they prevent customers from “abusing” software companies. What Mr. Felten fails to grasp, however, is that I have not weighed in on the policy question at all. My point is much simpler. My point addressed only the legal question and set forth the (apparently controversial) proposition that courts should be faithful to the law. In the case of EULAs, that means applying the same standards, the same doctrines, and the same rules as the courts have applied to analogous consumer contracts in the brick and mortar world. Is that too much to ask? Apparently it was not too much to ask of the federal court in Smallwood, because that was exactly how the court proceeded. Mr. Felten’s only discussion of why the Smallwood decision may be legally incorrect involves the question of whether or not “physical” injury occurred. Although this is an interesting factual question with respect to the plaintiff’s “Negligent Infliction of Emotional Distress” claim (count 7), the court found it irrelevant with respect to the plain-old negligence and gross negligence claims (counts 4 and 5). These were the counts that my original blog post primarily addressed. It’s hard to parse Prof. Zittrain’s precise legal reasoning from the quotes in Mr. Felten’s article, but it’s possible that the two of us would agree on the law. In any event, Mr. Felten is content to basically bypass the legal questions and merely fulminate–superficially, I might add–on the policy question.]

The case law governing software license agreements has evolved dramatically over the past 20 years as cataloged by Doug Phillips in his book The Software License Unveiled. One of the recent trends in this evolution, as correctly noted by Phillips, is that courts will often honor contractual limitations of liability which appear in these agreements, which seek to insulate the software company from various claims and categories of damages, notwithstanding the lack of bargaining power on the part of the user. The case law has been animated, in large part, by the normative economics of Judges associated with the University of Chicago. Certain courts, as a result, could be fairly criticized as being institutionally hostile to the user public at large. Phillips notes that a New York appellate court, in Moore v. Microsoft Corp., 741 N.Y.S.2d 91 (N.Y. App. Div. 2002), went so far as to hold that a contractual limitation of liability barred pursuit of claims for deceptive trade practices. Although the general rule is that deceit-based claims, as well as intentional torts, cannot be contractually waived in advance, there are various doctrines, exceptions, and findings that a court might use (or misuse) to sidestep the general rule. Such rulings are unsurprising at this point, because the user, as chronicled by Phillips, has been dying a slow death under the decisional law, with software license agreements routinely interpreted in favor of software companies on any number of issues.

It was against this backdrop that, on August 4, 2010, a software company seeking to use a contractual limitation of liability as a basis to dismiss various tort claims, met with stunning defeat. The U.S. District Court for the District of Hawaii ruled that the plaintiff’s gross negligence claims could proceed against the software company and that the contractual limitation of liability did not foreclose a potential recovery of punitive damages based on such claims. Furthermore, the matter remains in federal court in Hawaii notwithstanding a forum selection clause (section 15 of the User Agreement) in which the user apparently agreed “that any action or proceeding instituted under this Agreement shall be brought only in State courts of Travis County, State of Texas.”

The case is Smallwood v. NCsoft Corp., and involved the massively multiplayer, subscription-based online fantasy roll-playing game “Lineage II.” The plaintiff, a subscriber, alleged that the software company failed to warn of the “danger of psychological dependence or addiction from continued play” and that he had suffered physically from an addiction to the game. The plaintiff reportedly played Lineage II for 20,000 hours from 2004 through 2009. (Is there any higher accolade for a gaming company?) The plaintiff also alleged that, in September of 2009, he was “locked out” and “banned” from the game. The plaintiff claimed that the software company had told him he was banned “for engaging in an elaborate scheme to create real money transfers.” The plaintiff, in his Second Amended Complaint, couched his claims against the software company in terms of 8 separate counts: (1) misrepresentation/deceit, (2) unfair and deceptive trace practices, (3) defamation/libel/slander, (4) negligence, (5) gross negligence, (6) intentional infliction of emotional distress, (7) negligent infliction of emotional distress and (8) punitive damages.

The software company undertook to stop the lawsuit dead in its tracks and filed a motion to dismiss all counts. The defendants argued, among other things, that Section 12 of the User Agreement, entitled “Limitation of Liability,” foreclosed essentially any recovery. The provision, which is common in the industry, purported to cap the amount of the software company’s liability at the amount of the user’s account fees, the price of additional features, or the amount paid by the user to the software company in the preceding six months, whichever was less. The provision also stated that it barred incidental, consequential, and punitive damages:

12. Limitation of Liability
* * *
IN NO EVENT SHALL NC INTERACTIVE . . . BE LIABLE TO YOU OR TO ANY
THIRD PARTY FOR ANY SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL, CONSEQUENTIAL,
PUNITIVE OR EXEMPLARY DAMAGES . . . REGARDLESS OF THE THEORY
OF LIABILITY (INCLUDING CONTRACT, NEGLIGENCE, OR STRICT
LIABILITY) ARISING OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SERVICE,
THE SOFTWARE, YOUR ACCOUNT OR THIS AGREEMENT WHICH MAY BE
INCURRED BY YOU . . . .

The Court considered the parties’ arguments and then penned a whopping 49-page decision granting the software company’s motion to dismiss, but only partially. The Court determined that the User Agreement contained a valid “choice of law” provision stating that Texas law would govern the interpretation of the contract. However, the Court then ruled that both Texas and Hawaii law did not permit people to waive in advance their ability to make gross negligence claims. The plaintiff’s remaining negligence claims survived as well. The claims based on gross negligence remained viable for the full range of tort damages, including punitive damages, whereas the straight-up negligence-based claims would be subject to the contractually agreed on limitation on damages.

The fact that the gross negligence claims survived is significant in and of itself, but in reality having the right to sue for “gross negligence” is the functional equivalent of having the right to sue for straight-up negligence as well—thus radically broadening the scope of claims that (according to the court) cannot be waived in a User Agreement. Although it is true that negligence and gross negligence differ in theory (“negligence” = breach of the duty of ordinary care in the circumstances; “gross negligence” = conduct much worse than negligence), it is nearly impossible to pin down with precision the dividing line between the two concepts. Interestingly, Wikipedia notes that the Brits broadly distrust the concept of gross negligence and that, as far back as 1843, in Wilson v. Brett, Baron Rolfe “could see no difference between negligence and gross negligence; that it was the same thing, with the addition of a vituperative epithet.” True indeed.

The lack of a clear dividing line is an important tactical consideration. A plaintiff often pleads a single set of facts as supporting claims for both negligence and gross negligence and—in the absence of a contractual limitation on liability—expects both claims to survive a motion to dismiss, survive a motion for summary judgment, and make it to a jury. When the contractual limitation of liability is introduced into the mix, and the plaintiff is forced to give up the pure negligence claims, it hardly matters: the gross negligence claims—based on the exact same facts—cannot be waived (at least under Texas and Hawaii law) and therefore survive, at least up to the point of trial. Courts will not decide genuine factual disputes—that is the function of the jury. This is usually enough for the plaintiff, since the overwhelming majority of cases settle. Thus, a gross negligence claim, in most situations, is the functional equivalent of a negligence claim. For these reasons, the Smallwood decision, if it stands, may achieve some lasting significance in the software license wars.

Indian E-Voting Researcher Freed After Seven Days in Police Custody

FLASH: 4:47 a.m. EDT August 28 — Indian e-voting researcher Hari Prasad was released on bail an hour ago, after seven days in police custody. Magistrate D. H. Sharma reportedly praised Hari and made strong comments against the police, saying Hari has done service to his country. Full post later today.

Update: Indian E-Voting Researcher Remains in Police Custody

Update: 8/28 Indian E-Voting Researcher Freed After Seven Days in Police Custody

In case you’re just tuning in, e-voting researcher Hari Prasad, with whom I coauthored a paper exposing serious flaws in India’s electronic voting machines (EVMs), was arrested Saturday morning at his home in Hyderabad. The arresting officers told him they were acting under “pressure [from] the top,” and demanded that he disclose the identity of the anonymous source who provided the voting machine that we studied. Since then, Hari has been held in custody by the Mumbai police and repeatedly questioned.

Recent Developments

There have several developments in Hari’s case since my last post.

On Sunday, about 28 hours after his arrest, Hari appeared before a magistrate in Mumbai and was formally charged for the first time. The officers who arrested him had not stated a specific charge, but they had told him he would be left alone if he would reveal the identity of the source who provided us the machine . Hari has not named the source, and the authorities are now alleging that he took the machine from the government’s warehouse himself.

Specifically, he was charged under Section 454 of the Indian Penal Code (“lurking house-trespass or house-breaking in order to commit [an] offence punishable with imprisonment”), Section 457 (“lurking house trespass or house-breaking by night in order to commit an offence punishable with imprisonment”) and Section 380 (“theft in [a] dwelling house”).

These charges are without merit. Hari has never denied having been in possession of a machine—we even held it up for a photograph to accompany our paper—but the police have offered no evidence whatsoever that Hari ever trespassed in a government warehouse, much less stole a voting machine or anything else from one.

As I have previously stated, Hari obtained access to the machine from a source who approached him earlier this year. We have every reason to believe that the source had lawful access to the machine and made it available for scientific study as a matter of conscience, out of concern over potential security problems.

At Sunday’s hearing, Hari was remanded in police custody until today, when he appeared again before a magistrate and requested bail on medical grounds. (He is reported to be suffering from breathing problems.) The court refused to entertain the bail request and instead granted a police request that Hari remain in custody. The next hearing is scheduled for Saturday, at which time Hari can again seek bail.

One positive development is that Hari’s legal team now includes Mahesh Jethmalani and his father, Ram Jethmalani. I am told they are among the most sought after defense lawyers in India.

Keeping Sight of the Facts

Hari’s arrest has provoked explosive debate in India, not only about the arrest’s apparent political motives, but also about much broader questions our study raised over the security and transparency of India’s voting system. In the midst of this emotionally charged debate, I think it would be helpful to reiterate what our study does and does not reveal.

What the study I coauthored with Hari Prasad shows is essentially two things:

First, far from being “tamperproof,” India’s EVMs are vulnerable to most of the same security problems as the paper ballots they replaced—including an electronic form of booth capturing. Any time during or after the election, dishonest election insiders or other criminals with physical access to the machines can alter the votes stored inside.

Second, unlike the old paper ballot boxes, the EVMs can be tampered with long before elections take place to cause fraudulent results in the future. In other words, a dishonest insider or other criminal could manipulate an EVM today and have it steal votes months or years from now. You can’t do that with a ballot box.

What our study doesn’t show is that any election has ever been stolen by tampering with EVMs. Today’s EVMs are susceptible to tampering, and such tampering has the potential to change results in national elections, but our study does not even attempt to show that any past election result is invalid. Nobody can reasonably claim, based solely on the results we’ve presented, that an election now settled should be overturned.

Now that we know that EVMs have these vulnerabilities, it’s time for the Election Commission of India to stop pretending that the machines used today are perfect, and start working with India’s academic and technical communities to create a voting system that is worthy of voters’ trust.

It’s Time for India to Face its E-Voting Problem

The unjustified arrest of Indian e-voting researcher Hari Prasad, while an ordeal for Prasad and his family, and an embarrassment to the Indian authorities, has at least helped to focus attention on India’s risky electronic voting machines (EVMs).

Sadly, the Election Commission of India, which oversees the country’s elections, is still sticking to its position that the machines are “perfect” and “fully tamperproof”, despite evidence to the contrary including convincing peer-reviewed research by Prasad and colleagues, not to mention the common-sense fact that no affordable electronic device can ever hope to be perfect or tamperproof. The Election Commission can no longer plausibly deny that EVM vulnerabilities exist. The time has come for India to have an honest, public conversation about how it votes.

The starting point for this discussion must be to recognize the vulnerabilities of EVMs. Like paper ballots, the ballots stored in an EVM are subject to tampering during and after the election, unless they are monitored carefully. But EVMs, unlike paper ballots, are also subject to tampering before the election, perhaps months or years in advance. Indeed, for many EVMs these pre-election vulnerabilities are the most serious problem.

So which voting system should India use? That’s a question for the nation to decide based on its own circumstances, but it appears there is no simple answer. The EVMs have problems, and old-fashioned paper ballots have their own problems. Despite noisy claims to the contrary from various sides, showing that one is imperfect does not prove that the other must be used. Most importantly, the debate must recognize that there are more than two approaches — for example, most U.S. jurisdictions are now moving to systems that combine paper and electronics, such as precinct-count optical scan systems in which the voter marks a paper ballot that is immediately read by an electronic scanner. Whether a similar system would work well for India remains an open question, but there are many options, including new approaches that haven’t been invented yet, and India will need to do some serious analysis to figure out what is best.

To find the best voting system for India, the Election Commission will need all of the help it can get from India’s academic and technical communities. It will especially need help from people like Hari Prasad. Getting Prasad out of jail and back to work in his lab would not only serve justice — which should be reason enough to free him — but would also serve the voters of India, who deserve a better voting system than they have.

Electronic Voting Researcher Arrested Over Anonymous Source

Updates: 8/28 Alex Halderman: Indian E-Voting Researcher Freed After Seven Days in Police Custody
8/26 Alex Halderman: Indian E-Voting Researcher Remains in Police Custody
8/24 Ed Felten: It’s Time for India to Face its E-Voting Problem
8/22 Rop Gonggrijp: Hari is in jail 🙁

About four months ago, Ed Felten blogged about a research paper in which Hari Prasad, Rop Gonggrijp, and I detailed serious security flaws in India’s electronic voting machines. Indian election authorities have repeatedly claimed that the machines are “tamperproof,” but we demonstrated important vulnerabilities by studying a machine provided by an anonymous source.

The story took a disturbing turn a little over 24 hours ago, when my coauthor Hari Prasad was arrested by Indian authorities demanding to know the identity of that source.

At 5:30 Saturday morning, about ten police officers arrived at Hari’s home in Hyderabad. They questioned him about where he got the machine we studied, and at around 8 a.m. they placed him under arrest and proceeded to drive him to Mumbai, a 14 hour journey.

The police did not state a specific charge at the time of the arrest, but it appears to be a politically motivated attempt to uncover our anonymous source. The arresting officers told Hari that they were under “pressure [from] the top,” and that he would be left alone if he would reveal the source’s identity.

Hari was allowed to use his cell phone for a time, and I spoke with him as he was being driven by the police to Mumbai:

The Backstory

India uses paperless electronic voting machines nationwide, and the Election Commission of India, the country’s highest election authority, has often stated that the machines are “perfect” and “fully tamper-proof.” Despite widespread reports of election irregularities and suspicions of electronic fraud, the Election Commission has never permitted security researchers to complete an independent evaluation nor allowed the public to learn crucial technical details of the machines’ inner workings. Hari and others in India repeatedly offered to collaborate with the Election Commission to better understand the security of the machines, but they were not permitted to complete a serious review.

Then, in February of this year, an anonymous source approached Hari and offered a machine for him to study. This source requested anonymity, and we have honored this request. We have every reason to believe that the source had lawful access to the machine and made it available for scientific study as a matter of conscience, out of concern over potential security problems.

Later in February, Rop Gonggrijp and I joined Hari in Hyderabad and conducted a detailed security review of the machine. We discovered that, far from being tamperproof, it suffers from a number of weaknesses. There are many ways that dishonest election insiders or other criminals with physical access could tamper with the machines to change election results. We illustrated two ways that this could happen by constructing working demonstration attacks and detailed these findings in a research paper, Security Analysis of India’s Electronic Voting Machines. The paper recently completed peer review and will appear at the ACM Computer and Communications Security conference in October.

Our work has produced a hot debate in India. Many commentators have called for the machines to be scrapped, and 16 political parties representing almost half of the Indian parliament have expressed serious concerns about the use of electronic voting.

Earlier this month at EVT/WOTE, the leading international workshop for electronic voting research, two representatives from the Election Commission of India joined in a panel discussion with Narasimha Rao, a prominent Indian electronic voting critic, and me. (I will blog more about the panel in coming days.) After listening to the two sides argue over the security of India’s voting machines, 28 leading experts in attendance signed a letter to the Election Commission stating that “India’s [electronic voting machines] do not today provide security, verifiability, or transparency adequate for confidence in election results.”

Nevertheless, the Election Commission continues to deny that there is a security problem. Just a few days ago, Chief Election Commissioner S.Y. Quraishi told reporters that the machines “are practically totally tamper proof.”

Effects of the Arrest

This brings us to today’s arrest. Hari is spending Saturday night in a jail cell, and he told me he expects to be interrogated by the authorities in the morning. Hari has retained a lawyer, who will be flying to Mumbai in the next few hours and who hopes to be able to obtain bail within days. Hari seemed composed when I spoke to him, but he expressed great concern for his wife and children, as well as for the effect his arrest might have on other researchers who might consider studying electronic voting in India.

If any good has come from this, it’s that there has been an outpouring of support for Hari. He has received positive messages from people all over India.

Unfortunately, the entire issue distracts from the primary problem: India’s electronic voting machines have fundamental security flaws, and do not provide the transparency necessary for voters to have confidence in elections. To fix these problems, the Election Commission will need help from India’s technical community. Arresting and interrogating a key member of that community is enormously counterproductive.


Professor J. Alex Halderman is a computer scientist at the University of Michigan.