Are Online Travel Companies In India Adopting Unfair Practices?

Are online travel agencies in India violating cyber law of India? Are online travel companies in India adopting unfair practices? These are few of the questions that are making round these days.

These doubts and questions are arising because of the nebulous condition of e-commerce law of India. The e-commerce laws in India are still evolving and e-commerce stakeholders in India are not aware of cyber law due diligence in India. Neither the online travel companies nor the online consumers are aware of the consequences of online transactions entered in India in an improper manner.

To further aggravate the position, Indian cyber law is in a poor state of condition. In fact, techno legal experts like Praveen Dalal, managing partner of ICT law firm Perry4Law, have openly suggested repealing of the information technology act, 2000 (IT Act 2000) as it is clearly violating civil liberties in cyberspace.

"Personally, I believe that Indian Cyber law is outdated and it needs urgent repeal," Praveen Dalal said. However, he has been suggesting reforms for the same for the last five years. Dalal also feels that the Indian government is indifferent towards this much needed requisite.

As a result, online travel companies and other e-commerce companies and websites are operating in India with great disregard to the cyber law of India. Further, at times their activities are also suspicious. For instance, many of you must have realised that while booking air or other tickets online, the price of tickets increases substantially suddenly within few seconds.

Numerous complaints have also been lodged in this regard with the online travel companies and agencies of India. The travel portals have sidelined the issue by citing the same as a “technical error”.

This episode has happened in addition to the controversial practice of selling “opaque charges” where the name of the airline is not disclosed till the ticked is booked. Many airlines of India have openly protested against this practice and have either withdrawn their business completely from online travel portals or have reduced it to the sub minimum limits.

There is an urgent need to formulate dedicated laws for online travel companies and agencies of India. Till then the customers have to bear the irregularities and unfair practices on the part of airlines and online travel companies and agencies operating in India. However, they can take sufficient legal actions against both airlines and online travel companies and agencies where the situation and circumstances warrant so.  

Legal Rights Objections Under ICANN's New GTLD Program

ICANN is in the process of allotment of new generic top level domain names. Many organisations have applied to ICANN to get the desired GTLD. However, not all applied GTLDs would be allotted to the applicants as there may be many legal issues of new GTLDs applications and registrations that may surface while scrutinising the applications.

For instance, legal rights objections under ICANN's new GTLD domain registration program would arise as many trademark, tradename and intellectual property rights (IPRs) owners would file the same. There is a good possibility that such disputes would arise and ICANN has already made necessary arrangements in this regard.

The independent objector and legal rights objections for ICANN’s new GTLDs are two such important conflict resolution initiatives suggested by ICANN. Even private players have established platforms that could be used for resolving the disputes arising out of new GTLDs applications and registrations.

Legal rights objection assistance for new GTLDs by Perry4Law has also been offered. If fact, a dedicated platform known as “online arbitration” has been launched by Perry4Law Organisation to resolve domain name, new GTLDs, cyber squatting and other similar disputes.

New GTLDs, ICANN and domain names disputes resolutions is essentially techno legal in nature. Perry4Law Techno Legal Base (PTLB) is managing the exclusive techno legal online dispute resolution services in India and world wide. Perhaps, even ICANN can use the techno legal services of Perry4Law and PTLB for resolving its domain name disputes in general and new GTLDs disputes in particular.

Google Artificial And Unnatural Links Strategy

Google has been sending warning notifications to webmasters/owners of websites and blogs that are receiving back links from other websites in a manner that is not in compliance with Google’s webmaster Guidelines.

In the past many website owners have reported that Google has sent them warning notifications about artificial or unnatural links pointing towards their websites/blogs. This is not an ordinary and casual warning and its satisfactory and appropriate resolution is of utmost importance for website owners. Otherwise they may cease to enjoy the benefits of Google’s services especially search engine placements and other search placements.

Many of you may have wondered why your websites are performing poorly despite providing original, timely and genuine contents. This is because spam blogs are picking up your contents and are linking back to your websites and Google treats it as a negative act on your part as it is your website that is gaining PageRank and other ranks.

This exercise may also be a negative SEO technique adopted by your competitor to make your website and business suffer penalties through Google. There is no question of treating such activities lightly as it may affect your business interest in the long run.

Acting immediately against the culprits is the best option. The more you linger the worst would be the situation. Ultimately, a point would come where you have to convince Google to a great length to get back your websites in Google search results.

Either act on your own or hire the services of some good techno legal professionals in this regard if you have received one such notice from Google. If you need techno legal assistance in this regard, you may consult the ICT law firm Perry4Law in this regard. They have first hand and real life and almost real time experience in dealing with these types of cases.