Legal Statements
You have all probably heard of the new laws initiated by the FTC in USA but these are also applying in other countries due to agreements between countries. These changes come in on December 1st this year so if you have websites (including blogs) and have not taken action on this you need to act fast.
Basically you will need to disclose things like the fact you may be receiving payments for reviews or adverts on your sites. The safest option is to get hold of proper legal statements that will cover you for all eventualities as it seems this is serious and prosecutions are likely in some cases fo non-compliance.
There are many sources of the required documents being advertised at the moment. I have signed up with one called AutoWebLaw which you can access here
You can see my documents on the right under the ‘Legal Statements’ heading. These were all automatically produced from the site after entering just titles, names etc. Very easy and then it was just a case of uploading and setting up links for my blogs and websites.
I intend to have these statements on all my websites and blogs before December 1st. You should too.
Good luck
Regards
Dave Smith
Hi Dave, that’s some good advice mate. And its now law so we need to listen or we’ll feel the impact of it for years to come.
I’ve given you a good plug in my latest video Dave, hope you like it mate.
Regards, Barry
Have a great Christmas and all the best for the new year.
Hiya Dave,
Great advice. I’m also looking into this in a big way and have posted about it here…http://john-chadwick.com/ftc-ico-dpa/
I intend to do follow up posts as soon as I get round to it! It’s not just the FTC to worry about. The ICO (Information Commissioner’s Office – UK) and the DPA (Data Protection Act – UK) are to be considered as well. I also assume (although I have been known to be wrong!) that UK Trading Standars will be in on this issue as well as the distance sellinh laws (if selling online). What a nightmare!
I see so many sites with nil policies posted and they seem to get away with it but I think complacency could be a killer. Far better to ensure that you have done everything possible rather than end up on the wrong end of a lawsuit, or worse, in the Clink!
Cheers Mate
John Chadwick
Thanks Barry (have posted reply on your site) and thanks John for following up on the legal issue. It sounds even more of a problem than I realised and will be taking a look at your follow up posts as well as looking into it more myself (again when I get chance). I put what I thought was the minimum on all my sites but it is time consuming, even with statement generating software to make it easier, but I really need to take a further look at some time.
You’re also right about many people doing nothing so far. I believe there will be problems in the future for anyone without any statements posted. The FTC I understand are initially supposed to be issuing warnings first but you just know that the UK authorities will take it to extremes as with everything and start trying to penalise people straight away. I hope not but given the way they always embellish european laws I wouldn’t be surprised.
Cheers
Dave