Showing posts with label Internet. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Internet. Show all posts

Friday, May 28, 2010

Reverse Email Trace and IP Trace to Stop Internet Harassment

Internet harassment has become an increasingly common problem in recent years, but it can be easily addressed through the use such tools as reverse email trace and IP trace. One who has had an encounter with this kind of harassment should seek the help of a private investigator who is experienced the matter. Most private investigators are able to source the person behind the harassment in a matter of hours from just one email.

Maybe you've had the unfortunate experience of dealing with internet harassment, or perhaps you were unaware that it had even occurred. If you have received annoying or insulting emails from someone on numerous occasions, that is considered internet harassment. On a worse scale, if you've ever been threatened in a single email, that as well is internet harassment. It may have been the result of some brief interaction you had with someone over the internet, or possibly from someone with whom you have regular dealings. Either way, it's still considered all the same, some incidents just being worse than others.

You probably just deleted the emails, and ignored the person who sent them to you. And that's a common reaction for a lot of people who deal with internet harassment. It's a quick fix, and initially it may seem to be all that's needed. What about the person who won't stop sending those emails? And if you don't know who it is, then what do you do?

Well, you definitely want to consider employing the services of a private investigator. You'll need to have one or more of the harassing emails available for them to examine, usually one per offending email address. They will be able to perform a complete email trace from each of the emails and hopefully identify the sender. Additionally, you may want them to go a step further and conduct an IP trace as well, which will determine their exact location, or at least where they sent the emails from. This could come in hand if things get hectic and you have to involve law enforcement.

Each of these services combined are quite powerful, and will allow you to find out who you need to contact to report the abuse. The full email trace report will give you the real name of the sender of the emails, not just what they used to create the email accounts. You'll be given their address, a contact phone number, and if it's there to be found, the private investigator can even find out their place of employment. This is far more information than you'll ever get from the free email lookups that are floating around the internet. Most of the results from those aren't even real, they're just a mashup of information taken from other sites public databases. With a highly trained expert private investigator on your side, you can be confident that you'll be able to get right to the root of your internet harassment problems.

You don't have to put up with it, there is help available. Even if you're only dealing with pesky annoying emails, you might want to put an end to it before it gets worse. You need to find a reliable private investigator to take your case, and one who is an expert in the area of email tracing.

Tuesday, May 25, 2010

Internet Jurisdiction - Can You Sue From Home?

If you purchase an item on a small business website, but the product you receive does not conform to the specifications as indicated on the merchants website, what can you do? Can you file litigation in your home state, or must you sue them where the company is headquartered? Moreover, do you even have standing to assert a claim against a small business or individual seller?

In order to bring a suit, as in any other dispute, you as the injured party must be able to demonstrate jurisdiction. The court must have personal jurisdiction and subject matter jurisdiction over the area of law. This is an essential element of a claim because you generally want to be able to sue in your home county, let alone the state to which you're domiciled. The expense of traveling to another state and retaining local counsel can often offset the benefits even if you win your case. More to the point, if you can compel your adversary to travel to your state, the cost to defend the claim may be so cost prohibitive that you can effectuate a settlement over the claim with out ever appearing in court.

The key to determine if the court holds the power to bind a decision to the defendant is whether personal jurisdiction attaches. In Internet related cases, personal jurisdiction looks at the minimum contacts the seller has established in your state. The legal standard to consider is whether their commercial conduct has been continuous, voluntary, systematic and intentional.

Pursuant to Massachusetts's law, you can force a seller to litigate the claims in the jurisdiction of Massachusetts if they have filed for a foreign certificate of state, which is required of all businesses conducting commerce in Massachusetts. These companies who do file are also required to record a registered agent, who can be sued within the state. This registered agent can be found on Secretary of the State's website. In addition Rule 4 of the Massachusetts Rules of Civil Procedure, provides additional direction to hail defendants from foreign jurisdictions into the state.

Yet another method to demonstrate minimum contacts is to show that the seller is using geo-targeted pay per click (PPC) Google or Yahoo ads, coupled with a history of generating revenue from your state.

On the other side of the coin, a bad eBay or Craigslist transaction where a seller put his or her item for bid to anyone, anywhere and where you buy the item, would likely be held by a court as a lack of the aforementioned minimum contacts.

The bottom line is that determining the proper Internet Jurisdiction is not a simple matter. It require some investigation and a knowledge of your state's procedural law. It is always a good idea to consult with an attorney in your area who has a basis of knowledge relating to cyber law.