Internet & eCommerce
Your site is open. So is your potential exposure.
An online business is regulated like a storefront, even when the whole operation lives on a website, and the rules that govern it come from a stack of federal statutes, state laws, and platform policies that most owners never read until a problem arrives. Hank has counseled online companies on the agreements, disclosures, and compliance issues that keep a digital business running, from the terms a customer clicks to the platform deals that carry the revenue.
Your terms of service and privacy policy are the contract between you and every visitor, and they only bind a user who had reasonable notice and a chance to agree. Hank structures sign-up and checkout so acceptance is recorded, drafts the terms that set payment, returns, disclaimers, and how disputes get resolved, and writes the privacy policy that discloses what you collect and honors the choices state law now requires you to offer. A policy copied from another site describes a business you don't run and leaves the holes a plaintiff's lawyer looks for first.
Beyond the contracts, an online business answers to a body of rules built for the medium. Section 230 and the DMCA safe harbor protect a site that hosts user content, but only when you follow the notice-and-takedown steps; CAN-SPAM governs your marketing email; COPPA restricts collecting data from children under 13; and the FTC polices the disclosures behind your advertising, endorsements, and auto-renewing subscriptions. Hank maps which of these reach your business and builds the policies and processes that keep you on the right side of them before a regulator or a class action raises the question.
Hank has advised eCommerce sellers, software and SaaS companies, content platforms, and marketers on the legal side of operating online, often as the outside counsel they call when a takedown, a chargeback dispute, or a compliance question arrives. Every engagement works toward the same result, an online business documented well enough to scale, defend, and sell.
Services Include
- Website terms and conditions
- Privacy policies
- eCommerce agreements
- Online contracting
- Sweepstakes and contests
- Domain name issues
- Social media and content usage
- CAN-SPAM and COPPA-adjacent issues
Internet & eCommerce Insights
CAN-SPAM Compliance for Online Businesses: What the Law Requires for Every Marketing Email You Send
CAN-SPAM regulates commercial email whose primary purpose is advertising or promoting a commercial product or service. The law covers individual messages and bulk campaigns alike, including messages to business contacts, existing customers, subscribers, and consumers.
Read articleWebsite Terms of Service and Online Contract Formation
Your terms of service bind only the users who received legally sufficient notice and assented to them. When a dispute arrives, the company holding the arbitration clause has to prove which terms it offered, how the screen presented them, what action signified acceptance, who took that action, and which version governed the transaction.
Read articleSaaS Agreements for Providers and Their Customers
When you deliver software as a service, a product sale becomes an ongoing relationship. You host the application, control the infrastructure, release updates, process customer data, and keep the service available.
Read articleFTC Endorsement Guides and Influencer Disclosure
If someone has a relationship with a brand and publicly recommends that brand's product, the relationship may require disclosure. The FTC's Endorsement Guides, [16 C.F.R. Part 255](https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-16/chapter-I/subchapter-B/part-255), explain how Section 5 of the FTC Act applies to endorsements and testimonials. They cover social media posts, reviews, podcasts, videos, affiliate content, demonstrations, tags, and other messages consumers may understand as reflecting someone else's views or experience.
Read articleAuto Renewal and Subscription Compliance
If your business charges customers on a recurring basis, the enrollment page, confirmation, renewal notices, and cancellation process each create compliance obligations. Federal law and state statutes focus on material disclosures, informed consent, and a usable way to stop recurring charges.
Read articleSection 230 and Content Moderation
If your online business lets users post reviews, comments, listings, messages, or other material, Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act can limit when a claim treats you as the publisher or speaker of another person's content. The statute provides no blanket immunity for everything a platform does. The claim, the duty alleged, and the source of the information control the analysis.
Read articleRelated Work
Ready to make the right legal move?
Share the issue. Get direct attorney review. Receive a concrete recommendation.
Submit an Inquiry