Law & Technology Centre

The Law & Technology Centre is a joint Centre of the Department of Computer Science and the Faculty of Law at the University of Hong Kong. The Centre's mission is to provide public service in the interdisciplinary area of information technology and law, and to advance research in the relationships between information technology and law. The Centre's work encompasses all aspects of information technology and law, including computerisation of legal information on the Internet, intellectual property and computer forensics. The Centre is in close collaboration with the Centre for Information Security and Cryptography of the Department of Computer Science, which specialises in developing technologies relating to digital signature, data security and digital evidence.

The Centre is managed by a committee headed by two co-directors, one from the Computer Science Department and one from the Law Department. The current co-directors are Dr Kevin K H Pun (Computer Science) and Dr Anne Cheung (Law).

The web address for the Centre is
"www.lawtech.hk", "www.chinaitlaw.hk", "www.chinaitlaw.org.hk".

The current major project of the Centre is the Hong Kong Legal Information Institute (HKLII) <http://www.hklii.hk>. HKLII provides free Internet access to all primary sources of Hong Kong law, including legislation and judicial decisions, and is the only such legal information institute in Asia. It is part of the World Legal Information Institute (WorldLII) <http://www.worldlii.org>. In the period between 14 October 2003 and 1 April 2006, HKLII was accessed more than 710,000 times with an average access rate of between 800-1,000 per day. In January 2004, HKLII was selected by Yahoo as one of the 16 short-listed sites in the competition for the Ten Best Websites 2003 in Hong Kong.

Another regular activity of the Centre is "LawTech talks", in which experts are invited to give seminars on issues relating to information technology and law. Below are some of the talks that have been given in the past:

The Law of Digital Rights Management Systems (DRMs): Recent Developments in Europe

Privacy and Locational Surveillance: the New Paradigm and the New Challenge

Copy Right & Copy Wrong: Controversies of BT & Other Downloading Technologies

The Intellectual Property Land Rush: Has IP Gone Too Far?

Fraud and the internet - The problem of fake web sites

The Internet and Democracy – Has Hong Kong Left it Too Late?

3. Community Legal Information Centre (社區法網)

The Centre was awarded $3.18 million by the Department of Justice in March 2004 to establish a bilingual Community Legal Information Centre (CLIC), a website catered for the general public with no legal background. Covering 15 major areas of law, CLIC aims to offer a quick guide for the general public to find legal information and legal assistance in Hong Kong relating to legal problems that they may encounter. The website was launched in the summer of 2005 and is expected to be completed by 31 March 2007.