1. From Laws to Programs: A Logical Design Approach
Luigi Logrippo
University of Ottawa, SITE and
Université du Québec en Outaouais
With thanks to Waël Hassan

2. Motivation
The human world of E-Commerce is regulated by laws and regulations
The electronic world of E-Commerce is populated by agents who follow programs
Agents (machines) engage increasingly in legal behaviour, e.g.
they negotiate and conclude contracts
they can be in conflict and can be penalized
their penalties will affect humans
Programs must follow laws
09/04/2019

3. Where are we heading
In the information society real people and automatic agents will have interchangeable roles
Laws and programs will have to be seamlessly integrated
Their resolution mechanisms will have to be seamlessly integrated
Changes in laws should result in immediate changes in programs
Osmosis between machine and human world
09/04/2019

4. Business Exchanges Web Service Consumer Agent
Buy( Cell Phone , 15 day refund, GSM)
Available ( Vendor : X, Address: Texas)
Web
Service
Send a Request to
Buy a cell phone ,
<100$, GSM)
Rule & Policies( Refund 15 days)
Item arrives 10 days after order
Refund Item(7 days) after receipt
Customer
Service
Rules
Deny( Reason, 15 days Expired)
Cell Phone
defective
Ottawa Law declares
15 days from Delivery
You go and buy a cell phone
You exchange refund policy 15 days.  you are happy
You ask for ground shipping
It takes 10 days
You try to send it back 7 days after you bought it.
Vendor returns it saying No refund (15 days from Order day expired)
The Vendor is in Texas.
Texan Laws do not enforce rule
Canadian Laws enforce rule that 15 days is from Delivary
Texan Law says 15
days from Purchase
09/04/2019

5. I have a set of Policies and Preferences
myDocuments
myLocation
myContacts
myApplication
Settings
myCalendar
myInbox
myWallet
myMusic
myNotifications
myAddress
myFavorite
WebSites
I have a set of Policies and Preferences
Policy Interaction
We have our rules and Policies
Lets Agree on Policies
The entire .NET Passport account covers a wide variety of applications
we’re all familiar with MSN Messenger – note how easy it was to sign-up for this service if you were already a Hotmail user
One of the key services is myWallet
user’s credit card numbers and expiration dates, billing address, shipping address
when user clicks on the .NET Passport express purchase link on the checkout page, they are redirected to their .NET Passport wallet page through a secure SSL connection
info is transferred securely to merchant who uses it to complete the online purchase
easy way for users to purchase online
.NET Passport also available for mobile devices….but that’s a topic for another time
Microsoft trying to take over the world?
Source: Microsoft Corporation. (
I want to do Business
What should happen
in case the rules were conflicting or
if they meant different things to each party
09/04/2019
Confidential

6. Technological Context
On the law side, research is continuing in AI methods to (partially) automate logical deduction from laws to legal decisions
The related topic in computing is the Feature Interaction problem:
Agents being directed by policies to do conflicting things
Conflicts between agents doing different things
Conflicts between different levels of regulations for an agent
Possibly leading to malfunctions or unexpected results
Automatic conflict-resolution mechanisms may trigger in such situations
09/04/2019

7. Technological Context
Automatic derivation of programs from requirements
Complex methodology, because requirements are declarative
do not necessarily include execution mechanisms
are not necessarily complete
09/04/2019

8. What is the glue? What can keep it all together? The glue is
old logic (perhaps deontic logic), and
newer logic programming
Laws, regulations, policies, programs can be cast in the unifying language of logic and logic programming
09/04/2019

9. Executable laws
Laws and regulations expressed as logic programs are understood by the agents and executed
Conflicts can be detected and solved
at design time
or (more difficult) at execution time
Conflict-resolution mechanisms will draw the consequences of laws, policies, and regulations and will resolve conflicts in milliseconds
Using automatic deduction
09/04/2019

10. A fertile research area
Many interesting research topics at the crossroads of
information society
human law and legal theory
computer programming and software engineering
In the playfield of logic
09/04/2019