When it's in the contract, then it means that when you break the law you both break the law and the contract. SHould it be necessary? Perhaps not, but in some places that makes a meaningful difference.

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AnimalMuppet 2 days ago | parent [-]

Now I'm paranoid. To your knowledge, which places does it make a difference, and what difference does it make?

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fastball 2 days ago | parent | next [-]

Legal matters are almost never black and white. If someone does something illegal using my service, and some other 3rd party sues me as party to that illegal behavior, from a legal perspective having a clause like "no criminal behavior allowed" in there makes it easier for your lawyers to argue "my client clearly didn't intend to authorize/facilitate such behavior". This argument is of course made much stronger if it is paired with behavior, like banning (or attempting to ban) the criminal user as soon as the activity was identified.

But if you are paranoid you should speak with a lawyer in your jurisdiction.

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greycol a day ago | parent | prev [-]

In most places it doesn't make a difference to the outcome of the legal process what it does do is give you a quicker simpler off ramp from the legal process (which reduces costs) and may stop some idiots even trying to sue in the first place.

"Do not iron clothes while on body" should not be required to not be found liable, but it does change the question in court from providing discovery for safety consideration, how comprehensive is the manual, how... and the costs involved with that to "Did the customer use the device in a way that was it was clearly labelled to not be used? Did any part of the product packaging or instructions contradict this warning? ...Dismissed".

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abustamam a day ago | parent [-]

On top of that, I think my canister of Lysol wet wipes and many other bottles of cleaning chemicals says something like "it is against federal law to use this product for any purposes other than its intended use"

Like, yeah it's illegal to do illegal stuff with or without the label, but at least Lysol could say "we did tell him that he can't use it for that."

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codebje a day ago | parent [-]

It's illegal to do illegal stuff, but it's not illegal to do off-label usage stuff. If I want to take your hydrogen peroxide you sell as a surface disinfectant and mix it with vinegar and salt to etch my PCBs at home, that's my prerogative.

	▲	abustamam a day ago \| parent [-]
		Well, who's gonna tell on you? :) I don't have a bottle of H2O2 handy so I don't know if it normally has that disclaimer.