Re: Re: [cni] Re: Silly Confidentiality Notices

I have been convinced (I think) by our professional responsibility folks that confidentiality statements at the end are not worthless, just as copyright statements at the end are not worthless.

True, the damage is already done in some sense if the email went to the person "on the other side," but if it went to a third party, who is a least neutral, it does put the third party on notice that confidentiality is claimed. And, if it goes to the intended party, it puts them on notice.

Note that a fax message on the first page of a multi-page fax sent to an untended machine has the same problem. The machine will continue to receive the entire fax, regardless of the notice.

So...putting notices at the end of an email, like many items in life, is less than theoretically perfect, and may subject one to all sorts of nit-picking, but it may in fact be a reasonable balance between risk, damage, and feasibility, all things considered.

That said, it would be nice to have an automated system that would eliminate the notice where it was "not needed," but as spam filtering shows, it is hard to draw the line correctly with any sort of automated routine - even humans get it wrong.

Roland J. Cole, Executive Director
Software Patent Institute
11 South Meridian, #1313
INDIANAPOLIS IN 46204-3535
cole[_at_]spi.org; www.spi.org
317-231-7799; fax 317-231-7433 Received on Thu Aug 07 2003 - 00:26:26 GMT