Many people are concerned that information about their private life is more readily available and more easily captured on the Internet as compared to offline technologies. Specific concerns include unwanted email, credit card fraud, identity theft, and harassment. This paper analyzes key issues...

Some scholars have questioned the process by which cooperative standards are typically set, worrying about the potential for anticompetitive market power to come hand in hand with pro-competitive interoperability. To combat the perceived problems of ex post opportunism, the suggested solutions...

Royalty stacking, the most recent incarnation of the complements problem identified in the early 1800s by French engineer Augustine Cournot, has received considerable attention. The potential for royalty stacking within standard setting efforts arises from the fact that downstream manufacturing...

Much of the economic analysis on patent pools is theoretical, and nearly all of the models assume that participation is automatic - any firm with a relevant patent and an option to join a patent pool is assumed to do so. But allowing firms to opt out of patent pools is a far more realistic...

Security in software networks relies on technology, law, and economics. As the cost of software security breaches becomes more apparent, there has been greater interest in developing and implementing solutions for different parts of the problem. In this paper, we provide the first comprehensive...

Consumers and producers frequently rely on product ratings, such as college rankings, restaurant reviews and bond ratings. While much has been written about the structure of ratings in particular industries, little has been written on the general structure of different ratings industries and...

Several scholars have suggested that states should play a much more limited role in antitrust enforcement, especially in matters that are national or global in scope. In this paper, we analyze the states' part in the Microsoft case - a case that illustrates the costs of state intervention in...

As part of its “policy project to examine the legal and policy issues surrounding the problem of potential patent ‘hold-up’ when patented technologies are included in collaborative standards”, the Federal Trade Commission held an all-day workshop on June 21, 2011. The first panel of the...

E-commerce has experienced tremendous growth over the past few years. Nonetheless, senators, privacy watchdog groups, and the Federal Trade Commission have argued that e-commerce is being held back by consumer worries about online privacy and security. Some privacy advocates are calling for...

In the continuing debate over licensing standard essential patents (SEPs) with FRAND commitments (to license on fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory terms and conditions), one of the most heated topics is whether FRAND commitments should be interpreted to require licensing all comers, or...