Questions tagged [liability]
Use this for questions where the award of damages, or its possibility, is involved.
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Services liability for damages
If a service provider, such as a plumber, does a job incorrectly that directly results in extensive damage to your property, are they liable for the damages?
New Mexico, US
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Does buying property on mortgage gives any sort of protection against future Compulsory purchase & massive devaluation
Background (inserted editorially)
One of the risks of buying a flat / house is that the neighborhood will be declared blighted by the government which would then force property owners to sell their ...
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Hold Harmless-Want on half of LLC and NOT self
I recently applied to a position to teach yoga, as an independent contractor. I have formed an LLC, and now the gym would like me to sign a hold harmless agreement. I want to make sure the LLC is ...
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Can an employee be sued for gross negligence by reusing personal passwords at work?
An employee is using some easy guessable reused passwords well known to Have I Been Pwned.
OUCH.
Something bad happens.
Can an employee be sued?
Option A: An organization does not have password ...
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Do you loose liability protection if doing work for your LLC on your personal computer?
Do you have potential of loosing liability protection if doing work for your LLC on your personal computer (ie. a computer purchased with personal funds and not accounted for as being owned by the LLC)...
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Am I liable to my employer if I keep my notebooks past the term of employment?
As I work, I keep a notebook. At a high level, it is a list of things I need to accomplish on a given day, or within the next few weeks. Sometimes I also use it as scratch paper, which means that I ...
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Liability after accidentally breaking neighbor's sprinkler head
Imagine you are out for an early morning jog. Someone has their sprinklers on, so you cross the street to avoid them. Unfortunately, there was a malfunctioning sprinkler head that you didn't know ...
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Is it a violation to stop at a light in such a way as to prevent Cyclists from passing (USA)?
Hopped over to Bikes.SE to read the claim that "In some Jurisdictions, it is legal for bikes to pass on the right."
Is this even true?
If it is true, then I'd like to know if the following event I ...
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Can ignoring a person on the Internet make me responsible somehow?
A few days ago I got to know a person on a social network. We had a few days of innocuous conversations on WhatsApp, but then they started becoming intrusive and imposing and didn't respect my time. ...
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Has US law ever imposed liability for purely unethical behavior, unconnected to professional Codes of Ethics?
I'm familiar with the so-called ethics/law divide, where some acts may be lawful but unethical and other acts ethical but unlawful. This question is not about this.
I'm also familiar with ...
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Working on code with uncertain licensing at another company's behest
so the situation I want to ask you about is as follows:
The Client Company has a project that is made of three parts:
A front-end web app
A back-office
An API (back-end)
The front/back parts were ...
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Does US law have a notion of supply chain management?
I'm reading about a recent lawsuit filed by Delta Airlines against one of its vendors. Also see Delta Sues Software Provider Over Data Breach and Lawsuits target Delta and vendor for cybersecurity ...
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Legal liability for theft of credit card information left in my care with no contract?
Suppose your neighbor asks you to babysit their cat.
The neighbor has to run an errand so they leave it with me.
Someone else breaks into my house and steals the cat, along with its diamond necklace.
...
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Can I sue the U.S. Post Office for delivering Certified Mail that was open?
A couple of days ago, I went to my local post office and mailed a large envelope with paperwork inside of it and I had addressed it to me and my home address. The reason I did this was to do a 'poor ...
user22280
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Is employer responsible for tree damage to car parked in their lot (New Jersey, USA)?
During high winds a tree branch fell on my car while parked at my workplace. The cops were called, but the responding officer said that it was private property and my employer's responsibility. He ...
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Should car sharing company explicitly notify about accident liability when advertising?
On a car sharing company website, it advertises only benefits of its service but doesn't explicitly notify about insurance and liability in case of accident. Should car sharing company explicitly ...
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How long is a manufacturer liable for a product
Background:
I'm an electronics engineer thats considering designing and selling guitar effects pedals in the UK only. This is only intended as a side hobby (unless it becomes financially viable). As ...
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How do free-speech protections in the United States apply in public to corporate misrepresentations?
Last night, I was driving behind a truck that had a very official-looking sign like this:
(Sign says, "WARNING STAY BACK 200 FT. NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR BROKEN WINDSHIELDS!")
Some cursory Googling ...
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Liability from selling car if buyer does not complete title transfer : California
Suppose one sells a car (California registered) to a person (suspected after the fact to be an illegal immigrant) who does not complete title-transfer. Suppose that the seller completes and submits ...
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If I accidentally leaked my school's IP address and someone attempts a DDoS attack on my school am I at fault?
I found my schools IP address and if it accidentally got out and my school got a DDoS attack am I liable for damages? (I'm in Colorado if that helps.)
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Is there a law that says you have to care for a minor that isn’t your child?
If a minor that isn’t your child would die if unhelped, and you were the only one that could help them, is there any law saying you have to?
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Can I sell a Craigslist/FB Marketplace item in a local store?
I want to sell a high value cell phone but I also want to stay safe.
Are there any issues with me choosing a local grocery store or restaurant to conduct the transaction (goods for money)? Does it ...
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Legal exposure in publishing stock predictions
I was told that there might be legal aspects that I'm not aware of so I'm asking this question.
Since late November two AIs I've built have been generating predictions about stocks found on the ...
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Is it illegal to ask a company for money in exchange for information on a bug in their software?
Let's assume that I have a found a bug in a company's website/software which – if exploited – bypasses their paywall and allows me to use their website/software without any payments.
I then inform ...
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Is a contract valid if it releases a party from liability for probable injury?
Suppose party A contracts with party B to release party B of liability for all possible injury resulting from party B providing party A a service in which there is significant risk of injury. If a ...
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Liability of online service provider for illegal user content?
Suppose someone develops a chat app where you can send messages and pictures. Messages are stored in a database.
The developer, who is also the site owner, would have pretty much access to every ...
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Liability from attaching a note with tape to an improperly parked car?
I am a security officer for a private estate. I frequently deal with cars parking in a way that obstructs other vehicles.
On a recent occasion I asked the various tenants of the estate and each ...
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Was anyone held liable/accountable in the 2018 Hawaii False Missile Alert?
On January 13, 2018, with belligerent threats and nuclear tensions between the US and North Korea on a knife edge, civil authorities in the US state of Hawaii sent out an alert to all cell phones, ...
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What happens to a company's negative value property if it is liquidated?
What happens to annoying burdensome assets during a company's liquidation?
Perhaps a company owns a mine filled with deadly arsenic trioxide waiting to break out into the environment, or something ...
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Cyclist contacts overtaking car - who is at fault?
Say a car narrowly overtakes a cyclist who at that moment starts to signal that they want to turn by extending their arm outwards toward the car. The car left so little room that the cyclist ...
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What is a software developers liability for medical devices
I am an employee of a contract employer being contracted out to a medical company writing software for medical devices. What is my liability or who shoulders the legal expenses if a product I wrote ...
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Icy conditions, who is to blame?
We had a bout of freezing rain last week. While I was driving to work, I stopped at A US Customs Inspection Lane (I commute from Canada). Due to the crowning of the plaza, my car slid sideways 90 ...
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Can you unilaterally renege on a signed contract if the other party tries to push you into doing something illegal?
This question came up when I was reading this recent thread:
Is it illegal to infringe copyright if your boss or your client ordered you to do it?
in which that the poster was asking about a ...
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Is it illegal to infringe copyright if your boss or your client ordered you to do it?
The first possible scenario is this: suppose you work in a company, and you need to install some software for a client. The software needs to be purchased, but the boss tells you to just download it ...
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Closed-source licence that limits liability and warranty [closed]
Is there any software licence that I can freely grab that only limits my liability while not additionally allowing any distribution and have other open-source permissions? Since what I understand is ...
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Legal Limits for damage reparation
In the 2004 German movie The Edukators, part of the characters motivation revolves around a damage reparation:
"Jule is a waitress struggling to pay off a €100,000 debt she incurred a year ago when ...
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Is employer liable for theft of personal property
If I bring say my headphones to my work, and they are stolen under the following circumstances, can I legally sue my employer and prevail, i.e. they have a duty to provide reasonable safety and ...
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Is there a need for a license agreement when two programmers want to join forces on a common side project?
Recently me and an acquaintance have been talking about working together on a side project. I know he operates his own LLC and probably wants to release the side project under the LLC which is fine. ...
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What are the legal risks in removing other people's baggage from a conveyor in baggage reclaim?
I originally asked this on Travel.SE, but didn't get any useful answers. So I thought I'd ask about the legal aspects here. For further details on why I was doing it, see the Travel.SE question.
When ...
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By selling a flagged solution to a student to catch them cheating, would the seller be liable for the breach of contract?
This is a follow up question to this HNQ question from academia.
Suppose a student S posts an assignment for school/university/... on a freelancer website. A faculty member F sees this and agrees to ...
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What is the company structure that will effectively limit liability to the parent company, and not any of it's subdivisions?
I'm exploring different kinds of corporate structures. I'm in a unique situation where I have a very specialized construction industry but can operate under the blanket term "General contracting".
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Car insurance and liability in Michigan
Insurance typically follows the car and not the driver, which means other licensed drivers can use your car. However, and I'm aware this is policy dependent, insurers generally do not allow for ...
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Roommate caused water damage to our condo, what are my options?
I live with 3 roommates and all 4 of us are on a lease for the condo owned by our landlord.
TL;DR my roommate "Jim" caused water damage to several rooms and I'm looking for advice on what I can ...
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Responsibility of Microsoft for a bug in MS Excel
Our company is using a licensed version of Microsoft Products, including MS Excel 2016. We suffered some financial damage because of incorrect financial calculations, that occurred as a result of the ...
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Can previous homeowner file a claim for hidden damage on their old property?
We purchased a house in Texas 5 months ago. 3 months ago we discovered hidden water damage from a roof leak within exterior walls.
Our insurance hired a third party engineering firm who concluded the ...
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Legal Liability for mentally infirm
This is a fictionalized question to help me understand an element of liability I stumbled across recently. My parents are not infirm and do not live with me.
I am well past the age of majority. One ...
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Can Mobile App Terms of Use contain General liability release?
The intent is a smart phone based app, which functions as a service(think ride share type of services). Wish to provide said service without insurance to test market feasibility.
Definition(s): '...
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What can individual programmers do to limit their liability risks from programs that they make available to the public?
This questions stems from my earlier question, Do individual programmers expose themselves to liability risks when they make their programs available to the public?. From the answers to the above ...
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Closed Source License with No Liability?
I’m writing a closed source program with a small group of people. We will be distributing it without the code, but I’m worried about two things:
If my program deletes the user’s files or causes any ...
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Do individual programmers expose themselves to liability risks when they make their programs available to the public?
There are numerous useful apps, software programs, web applications, browser plug-ins, etc., that have been produced by individual programmers. Are these programmers exposing themselves to personal ...
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