wired survey on iphone 3g speeds worldwide (including canada)

As the title suggests, Wired has published an article on iPhone 3G speeds worldwide. Us Canucks seemed to have fared relatively well:

# Canadian carriers Rogers and Fido tied for second fastest with an average download speed of about 1,330 Kbps on average.

That’s second worldwide by carrier. T-Mobile in Europe won the prize with average speed of 1,822 Kbps while AT&T in the US averaged a somewhat sad 990.

That being said, even the slow, slow bandwidth in ths US is a wee bit faster than the turtle-like (comparatively speaking) max 120 Kbps that Rogers’ EDGE provides.

Time to go get an iphone. Or maybe a Bold.

Pretexting, Canadian Style

From one of my very smart colleagues at the firm – a recent Canadian case involving “pretexting” like activity a la HP.

The short story: A company hires an investigator to see what some former employees are up to, since they’ve started a competing business. Based on what they find out, they sue the employees. In discovery (in rough terms, the process through which each party gets to look at the information that the other side has supporting their case), the employees find out that the investigator has obtained their phone records and also has recorded them on video at their business premises, in both cases without their consent and without a court order.

Sound somewhat familiar?

So the employees countersue the company and the investigator. It turns our that the company wasn’t aware of the methods used by the investigator and so is left off the hook, but the action against the investigators is given the green light.

Whether or not the claim of the employees will succeed remains to be seen. In the meantime, folks thinking of using investigators, for whatever purpose, would be wise to give serious consideration to the nature of information that they want to collect.

Pretexting, Ethics and Clients

Still catching up a bit – very quick post on the HP “pretexting” thing. As you may recall, HP asserted that its practice of pretexting – i.e. pretending to be someone else to get confidential telephone records – was legal. They were investigated leaks to the press by one of their board members and had resorted to this practice to try and find the leak. I had commented elsewhere long ago when this story first broke that even if it were illegal, very few (if anyone) could consider such actions the least bit ethical.

As most of you know apparently there was some disagreement as to legality and a few folks at HP were charged. Then I read this recent story about how HP was ending its special ties to Larry Sonsini, of the California powerhouse firm of Wilson Sonsini:

Sonsini – famous for decades in these parts – gained national fame in September during HP’s spy scandal hearings in front of Congress. Emails between the lawyer, HP executives and former director Tom Perkins raised serious questions about how sound Sonsini’s advice was around the practice of pretexting. He seemed to indicate that phone record fraud sounded like fair game, after being nudged in that direction by HP’s internal lawyers.

My emphasis. Its unfortunate to hear of something like this. I don’t doubt that he took the time and effort to research the law to come to a reasonable opinion on the matter before advising his client – obviously it was a very grey area of the law. In those circumstances its unfortunate that he didn’t perhaps suggest, notwithstanding the black letter of the law, that it would be unwise do take the course of action they were contemplating. That as good corporate citizens with a significant public profile, that such a practice is not something they should even consider. But then again, maybe he did and they didn’t listen (and of course he would surely have the good sense never to say that in public and embarrass a major client) or maybe he thought that such comments were not for legal counsel to make. Who knows.

The situation is not unfamiliar to many lawyers – particularly when it comes to giving opinions – lawyers are sometimes subjected to pressure to deliver the opinion that a client wants to hear rather than the one they should probably be delivering. By this I’m certainly not suggesting lawyers are delivering bad or incorrect opinions. What I am saying is that there are often grey areas of the law (which tend to be the areas on which legal expertise are sought) and in respect of which opinions can go one of two or more ways. And sometimes, the client will want to hear a certain outcome – for example, in the case of HP, I’m sure they would have liked the comfort to hear from their external counsel that their actions were legal – it would serve as some evidence that they took some degree of diligence and could serve to mitigate consequences if it turned out governmental authorities differed. If he, on the other hand, refused, or proffered a legal opinion that it was fine but qualified with a recommendation not to take such actions, HP likely would have not been very happy with him. And everyone knows what happens when clients aren’t happy.

Its an unfortunate situation to be in. Particuarly in this case, where, at the end of the day, HP still, obviously, isn’t happy with him.