ABSTRACT
Thus, software containing a virus would clearly be unmerchantable, because it is flawed. Similarly, examples which do not correspond to the manufacturerÕs specification in other respects would be flawed. A program for operating a machine tool which failed to warn that it should not be operated to process certain materials which it might reasonably have been supposed it would deal with, should be held to be unfit for the purposes for which it was sold.3 The facts in Jones v Minnesota Mining & Manufacturing4 can be used to illustrate the third way in which the quality warranties might be broken. In that case software was used to calculate the dose of radiation to be given to cancer patients. Some patients suffered serious injury through being given overdoses. Although at the end of the day the defect was found to have been due to the fact that faulty data had been fed into the program, presumably if the data had been correct, but the cause of the over-prescribing been that the program had been wrongly written, there could have been liability under the third head on this ground.
