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Press Release FOR GENERAL RELEASE 27th February 2001 The International Online Bridge Club (Bridge Player LIVE!), Europe's foremost provider of live Internet bridge (http://www.bridgeplayer.com) was recently forced to instruct solicitors to protect its confidential, copyrighted database that had been downloaded from Online Bridge’s computer without its knowledge or consent. IOBC are the service provider for the English Bridge Union’s ("EBU") own Online Bridge Club (http://www.ebuonline.co.uk). An IOBC computer was being used for a demonstration of the EBU Online Bridge Club at the EBU’s annual Summer Congress in Brighton, England last August. A third party obtained details of more than 25,000 contact addresses from this computer, without permission, and the database was stored onto floppy disk. The disk was passed to British bridge journalist, Mark Horton, who gave the database to E-Bridge Inc, a US based competitor of IOBC. Mailings using this data were made by E-Bridge who were immediately contacted by IOBC’s solicitors to stop further activity. E-Bridge have since signed an undertaking, without admitting liability, confirming they have stopped using the information and that it has been deleted from their computer system. E-Bridge have maintained that they did not know how the disk had been obtained. Mr Horton, for his part, has agreed to an out of court settlement for undisclosed costs and damages. The International On Line Bridge Club Limited
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