Dear All,

> >The information in this e-mail and any attachments is confidential and may
> >be subject to legal profesional privilege. It is intended solely for the
> >attention and use of the named addressee(s). If you are not the intended
> >recipient, or person responsible for delivering this information to the
> >intended recipient, please notify the sender immediately. Unless you are
> >the intended recipient or his/her representative you are not authorised
> >to, and must not, read, copy, distribute, use or retain this message or 
> >any part of it.

> It fixes the recipient (or interceptor) with notice that the e-mail is
> confidential. It does as much as can be done

Some quick thoughts on the disclaimer.

First, if the e-mail is not between a legal representative and client, 
it does not seem likely that it would attract 'legal professional 
privilege'.  Thus, in many cases this wording is likely to be 
redundant (unless its purpose is to put the frighteners on the 
average citizen).

Second, most people seem to put these types of disclaimers at 
the end of the e-mail, by which time the recipient has usually read 
them, rendering at least some of the " must not read, copy, 
distribute etc etc" redundant as well.  In fact in most e-mail 
packages the recipient has created copies simply by opening the e-
mail.  These disclaimers seem to have originated with faxes where 
they were sent as the cover sheet, and law firms in particular seem 
to have simply lifted their fax warning and put it on their e-mails, 
without giving much thought to the relevance or logic of doing so.

Third, there needs to be some discrimination as to when these 
types of disclaimer are used.  Many people who use them have 
them in their sig blocks, and don't bother to  use different sig 
blocks for different purposes.  Thus I frequently get e-mail 
messages that have been sent to large scale mailing lists, with just 
such disclaimers attached.  This has a two-fold effect.  First it 
makes it  more difficult to decide when someone is being serious 
about their "warning" and when they are simply being lazy.  
Second, it irritates list members who get sent messages which 
consist of a terse rejoinder to a thread and a huge and 
unnecessary legal disclaimer.

Fourth, if it really such a confidential message, why are you 
sending it by unencrypted e-mail.  E-mail can be intercepted 
accidentally, or on purpose, fairly easily by sysadmins and others, 
and as you can see on a daily basis on mailing lists it is equally 
easy to send your confidential message to hundreds of people 
around the world simply by not being careful about the destination 
address.  If the e-mail isn't important enough to encrypt, it probably 
isn't important enough to justify a long winded warning.

Thus, my suggestion would be that the warnings are of dubious 
legal value, they are often poorly drafted for the e-mail environment, 
and usually placed at an inappropriate place in the e-mail.  People 
using them often fail to use them properly, i.e. only for confidential 
info., and by and large, their major effect is to amuse and/or irritate 
other people.  Essentially the use of such disclaimers is a lazy 
way of putting off the creation of an institutional e-mail and digital 
information policy which lays out what can be sent by e-mail and 
whether or not it should be encrypted (and also delays the day 
when people have to learn how to use encryption).

My two €


Andrew Charlesworth
Senior Lecturer in IT law
Director, Information Law and Technology Unit
University of Hull Law School
Hull, UK, HU6 7RX
Voice: 01482 466387   Fax:   01482 466388
E-mail: [log in to unmask]


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