Abstract:
Nowadays the advancement of computer technology increases more and more all the time both in communication and commercial transaction on the internet network. Such advancement comes to play its role on the dispute settlement until it gives rise to the idea of finding the form of dispute settlement that applies the computer technology for communication using the internet network. Therefore, the dispute settlement through the Internet is discovered in the forms of negotiation, conciliation, and the settlement of dispute through arbitrator. There are many websites that provide this kind of services at present. However, there is still no clear guideline for proceeding dispute settlement through the arbitrator in Thailand. There are many forms of transaction on the internet. The service provider of each form facilitates the users with convenience, quickness and time saving that the transaction on the Internet becomes very popular in the matters of product trading, bidding, money payment and information providing services. Regarding the business transaction on the internet, most of the contractual parties may not live in the same country. Should there be any dispute about internet transaction, the treatment of damages will be difficult to settle as such dispute arises internationally and on the amount of property that is not high enough to file the lawsuit in the court of the country where another contractual party lives owing to the high cost of expense. If the case is proceeded in the country of the petitioner, the decision of the court in that country cannot be enforced in the other country where the defendant lives. However, if the contractual parties have agreed to settle the dispute by way of arbitration, the absolute decision of the arbitrator can be enforced in another country through the provision of the New York Convention on the acceptance, recognition and enforcement of the decision by foreign arbitrator A.D. 1958. At present, many websites all over the world are opened to settle the dispute through arbitrators on the internet, both institution and non-institution, including the arbitration and conciliation center of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). Such institution received the complaints of dispute on the highest level of domain names which are ordinary words of universal level (gTLD) amounted to 5,922 cases in 115 countries. Moreover, there are disputes on domain names at the highest level which are the names of the countries (ccTLD), entered into the consideration of the center through the cooperation of the NIC in each country, amounted to 168 cases in 138 countries. Apart from the Arbitration and Conciliation Center of the WIPO, there are many institutions dealing with dispute settlement by ways of negotiation, conciliation and arbitration on the internet as mentioned earlier by the author. This substantial paper aimed to study the contents on the part of principles and provisions of law concerning the Internet transactions and the dispute settlements through arbitrators on the internet network. The study was carried out by studying the provisions of the law of the Arbitration and Conciliation Center of the WIPO, in order to show clearly that the dispute settlements through arbitrators on the internet network are convenient, quick and money saving; as well as to bring the internet dispute settlement through arbitrators to use in the internet network business transactions in the cases which have not so high property value, instead of filing the lawsuit in the court, which also helps reducing the number of court cases to the lower amount.