Electronic Standard Contract Law From the Perspective of Consumer Protection

Electronic commerce (e-commerce) is now an established practice that is governed by national laws. Electronic agreement/contract is a conventional agreement with a propensity to harm consumers. A standard agreement is required in commercial practice, but its legality remains contested due to the nature of the agreement itself. However, its status is acknowledged and governed by the Consumer Protection Act. Consequently, the purpose of this study is to determine how the legislation of electronic standard agreements relates to consumer protection. This study is normative legal research employing both a statutory and a conceptual method. Results indicate that the standard electronic agreement is valid and does not contradict with Article 18 of Law No. 8 of 1999, Article 1320 of the Civil Law Law, and Article 9 of Law No. 11 of 2008. Research also found that so far the standard agreement tends to harm consumers because it is misused by producers by providing conditions that are very detrimental to consumers such as a standard clause that goods purchased cannot be returned, Damaged/lost goods are not the responsibility of the producer. From the research it was also found that       BPSK and LPKSM as non-governmental institutions that have the task of protecting consumers have not carried out their roles properly

Foundations of B2B electronic contracting

Nowadays, flexible electronic cooperation paradigms are required for core business processes to meet the speed and flexibility requirements dictated by fast-changing markets. These paradigms should include the functionality to establish the formal business relationship required by the importance of these core processes. The business relationship should be established in an automated, electronic way in order to match the speed and flexibility requirements mentioned above. As such, it should considerably improve on the ineffectiveness and inefficiency of traditional contracting in this context. The result of the establishment should be a detailed electronic contract that contains a complete specification of the intended cooperation between organizations. Electronic contracts should contain a precise and unambiguous specification of the collaboration at both the conceptual and technological level. Existing commercial software solutions for business-to-business contracting provide low level of automation and concentrate solely on the automated management of the contract enactment. However, in the modern, dynamic, business settings, an econtracting system has to support high automation of the e-contract establishment, enactment, and management. In the thesis, the business, legal, and technological requirements for the development of a highly automated e-contracting system are investigated. Models that satisfy these requirements and that can be used as a foundation for the implementation of an electronic contracting system are defined. First, the thesis presents the business benefits introduced to companies by highly automated electronic contracting. Next, a data and process analysis of electronic contracting is presented. The specification of electronic contracts and the required process support for electronic contract establishment and enactment are investigated. The business benefits and data and process models defined in the thesis are validated on the basis of two business cases from on-line advertising, namely the cases of online advertising in "De Telegraaf" and "Google". Finally, the thesis presents a specification of the functionalities that must be provided by an e-contracting system. A conceptual reference architecture that can be used as a starting point in the design and implementation of an electronic contracting system is defined. The work in the thesis is conducted on the intersection of the scientific areas of conceptual information and process modeling and specification on the one hand and distributed information system architecture modeling on the other hand

A rapid appraisal of institutions supporting Somali livestock export

This publication presents finding of a rapid appraisal of institutions supporting livestock trade and marketing in Somalia. The study was carried to: identify institutions supporting livestock trade and marketing in the country; evaluate the roles played by these institutions in facilitating livestock trade and marketing information flow; application of grades and standards in livestock trade, and livestock export marketing promotional activities; assess the level of networking among these institutions while facilitating livestock export trade and marketing; analyze constraints faced by these institutions in executing their activities. It was anticipated that this will be useful in designing supportive infrastructure to enable them play an effective role in improving livestock trade and marketing through enhanced accountability and competence. Emphasis was put on organizations involved in livestock marketing information flow, application of grades and standards in livestock products, and, livestock export promotion. This study identifi ed some forms of organizations supporting livestock export trade in Somalia, viz. brokers, veterinary services delivery systems, port authorities, livestock shipping firms, money transfer services, local government and regional administrations that were in-charge of livestock markets, central government, and a variety of private traders associations. These organisations supported the principal market participants: the small-scale traders, agents of exporters, and exporters in their trial to make effective livestock export trade. The organizations operated under a set of rules and procedures that influenced their activities in facilitating livestock. However, it was noted that there was limited capacity to enforce adherence to some of the rules and regulations by these organizations. This appraisal recognized that although there exist informal grading system based on a number of attributes (age of animal, sex of animal, nutritional status, weight and size, breed and health status), none of the identified institutions was engaged in overt activities to develop further and publicize application of these grades in livestock trade. This was noted to persist despite the general knowledge that suitable grading would significantly promote trade. This appraisal established that currently, the main centre of attention of the public sector is at the ports of exit. In these ports, the government implements a rudimentary animal health certifi cation system, based on clinical inspection of animals prior to loading. There are also some instances of monitoring in some of the secondary markets. Implementation of an effective health and certification system is constrained by limited capacity, both human and physical within the respective institutions and by the absence of a central veterinary administration that is recognized internationally. These constraints need urgent redress to guarantee participation in livestock export trade by Somali traders. It is important to note that a certification system put in place should also be cost effective and easy to apply in order to be sustainable

Mapping ISO 27002 into security ontology

In recent years, due to the increasingly interconnected environment, information is exposed to a growing number of threats and vulnerabilities. Therefore, it is especially important for an organization to have an efficient information security management system. Recently, it has been observed that organisations are looking for standards of best practice for guidance on how to manage their information security infrastructures. In this way, they can demonstrate that their information is adequately secured, and show to their customers and business partners that they can be trusted with protection of the important information. This document presents a methodology of mapping the ISO 27002 standard knowledge to the security ontology and it is intended for organisations that aim to maintain compliance with it