Webbots, Spiders, and Screen Scrapers

Internet Law

While the laws protecting physical property are long established and reinforced by considerable numbers of court rulings, the laws governing virtual property and virtual behavior are less mature and constantly evolving. While one would think the same laws should protect both online and offline property, the reality is that most laws were written before the Internet and don't directly address those things that are unique to it, like email, frames, hyperlinks, or blogs. Since many existing laws do not specifically address the Internet, the application of the law (as it applies to the Internet) is open to much interpretation.

One example of a law to deal specifically with Internet abuse is Virginia's so-called Anti-Spam Law.^[90] This ...