The Prospects of Jurisdictional Issues in Cyberspace

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Cyberspace is a factitious environment without solid boundary which makes it very different from the physical world. This fact has a significant meaning when personal jurisdiction issue is discussed because physical boundary is generally an important consideration in the issue of jurisdiction. Whether or how the ordinary rule would still apply to Cyberspace and whether a new standard should replace such ordinary rule are vigorously discussed in the state sovereignty. Diverse approaches in different state sovereignties under the current situation related to the physically out-of-state defendant make the jurisdiction issue highly unpredictable within Cyberspace. In this article, different approaches are introduced to deal with the jurisdictional issue over physically out-of-state defendants in different state sovereignties. Besides explaining different approaches, this article will also discuss and analyze several tentative solutions brought up by commentators to show that they are not all satisfactory to some extent with regard to this issue. Then, this article will try to come up with some kind of legal infrastructure in order to encounter the current complex situation in the issue of Cyberspace jurisdiction, especially to the physically out-of-state defendant situation, which is the main purpose in this article. Last but not the least, this article might also contribute to possible future legislative modification in state sovereignty.