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UCITA는 디지털정보거래에 적용되는 계약법을 명확히 하고 이를 통일하고자 한다. 종래 보통 법과 UCC 제2편이 복잡하게 혼합되어 디지털정보거래에 적용되어 왔다. 그 결과 여러 중요한 법적 문제의 해결이 명확하지 않았다 [예컨대, 접속계약에서 정보제공자의 의무는 무엇인가? 라 이센스에서 복제물의 소유권은 정보이용자에게 이전하는가? 라이센스의 범위를 일탈하는 것이 계약위반인가? 등]. 전자상거래에 있어 법적 명확화의 필요는 분명하다. 온라인체제는 거래관계 를 개설하고 거래를 수행하는 방법을 변화시켰지만, 여전히 온라인에 의한 계약체결에 관한 많은 문제가 미해결상태이다. 오늘날의 계약법은 이들 문제를 포함한 많은 다른 문제에 대해서도 그 해결지침을 제공하여야 한다. 전자상거래와 디지털정보거래 분야에서의 계약법은 앞으로 수년간 계속 변모할 것이다. UCITA는 이러한 변모가 일관성 있게 통일적으로 행해질 수 있도록 하는 잠재력을 가지고 있다.

UCITA clarifies and will make uniform contract law applicable to computer information transactions. A complex mix of common law and Article 2 governs computer information transactions. It fails to give clarity for many of the most important legal issues: What is the obligation of an access contract provider? Does title to a copy pass to the licensee in a license? Is exceeding a license a breach of contract? etc.…. The need for clarity is vivid in electronic commerce. Online systems have changed how transactions occur and many information transactions are performed. Yet, many issues in contracting online are unanswered. A modern contract law must provide guidance on those issues and many others; failure to do so does not foster, but impedes commerce in computer information. Contract law pertaining to electronic commerce and to commerce in computer information will be recast during the next several years. UCITA offers the potential that this will be done in a coherent and uniform manner, rather than in idiosyncratic legislation the cost of discovering and complying with which will be huge. UCITA is a commercial statute. It expressly supports the idea that contract freedom is a basic tenet of contract law. It provides a solid, needed basis for information commerce. UCITA is a contract law statute. It does not change, modify or create property rights. The difference between contract and property is that contracts are between two people, but property rights are good against the world. UCITA deals with contracts, not property.

오늘날 우리 경제는 소위 "정보혁명"이라 하는 또 다른 근본적 변화를 경험하고 있다. 이러한 정보 및 서비스는 현 경제의 중심에 자리잡고 있다. 이러한 변화 중의 하나가 거래방법의 다양화[디지털정보를 현대적 시장의 수요에 알맞은 정보제품 내지 정보자원으로 범용/맞춤 제작을 하여 이를 배포하는 방법 등]이다. 이러한 다양화는 계약에 의하여 실현된다. 이는 계약(계약조건)이 가지는 자체적 탄력성[사적자치의 원칙]에 힘입어 정보제품이 시장에 최적화될 수 있기 때문이다. 경제의 근본적 변화는 지금 그대로의 상사적 계약법이 이러한 새로운 거래객체와 새로운 시장에 과연 적합한지를 재검토할 것을 요구한다. UCITA는 이러한 요구에 대한 하나의 응답이다. 물품의 '매매'는 디지털정보의 거래[예컨대, 컴퓨터 DB나 컴퓨터 S/W의 라이센스]와 다르다. 계약당사자들이 당해 거래에서 기대하는 바가 다르고, 당해 업계의 관습이 다르고, 실체적인 정책이 다르고 또한 상업적 배경이 다르다. 따라서 "디지털 정보거래"에 "물품 매매" 기초한 계약법을 적용해서는 안 된다. UCITA는 정보경제에서의 거래객체를 다루는 최초의 일반적 계약법이다.

Our economy today has experienced another fundamental change:the information revolution. Information and information services are now the center of the economy. Among the changes that this causes is a wildly diverse array of methods of distributing and tailoring digital information to form information products and resources that fit the modern marketplace. Many of these rely on contract terms to fit the product to the market. UCITA responds to the fact that fundamental economic change demands reconsideration of commercial contract law to tailor it to this new subject matter and this new market. Sales of goods are different from transactions in computer information. A sale of a chair or a toaster (the grist of Article 2) is different from a license of a computer database or software (the focus of UCITA). There are different expectations, different industry practices, different substantive policies, and different commercial backgrounds. Transactions as different as these should not be governed by contract law based on the images and patterns of one type of transaction to the exclusion of the other. UCITA is the first general contract law to address the subject matter of the information economy.

A license under UCITA(Uniform Computer Information Transactions Act) which represents the first comprehensive uniform computer information licensing law is not fundamentally rooted in intellectual property law such as patent or copyright law. A license under UCITA is simply a commercial contract, dependent wholly on the parties' ability to enter into a normal, commercial contract, just as a contract of sale or lease is simply and wholly a commercial contract. However, intellectual property rights may be licensed in a contract subject to UCITA. UCITA may not be used to vary or extend informational rights that are intellectual property rights, and expressly recognizes preemption by copyright, patent, or other federal intellectual property law in Section 105(b). Like the law of sales and leases, in general, the right to contract is constrained by principles of unconscionability, good faith and fair dealing, UCITA has an additional restraint, an express power for a court to deny enforcement of a provision in a licensing contract that violates fundamental public policy. This public policy defense is unique in UCITA. An essential purpose of this defense is to give courts some latitude in reconciling commercial licensing law with the principles of intellectual property law. Most intellectual property law is federal, and UCITA expressly recognizes the preemptive effect of that federal law. But the public policy defense gives courts an additional power to consider intellectual property principles purely within the context commercial law.

The Uniform Computer Information Transactions Act (UCITA) represents the first comprehensive uniform computer information licensing law. A license under UCITA is not fundamentally rooted in intellectual property law such as patent or copyright law. A license under UCITA is simply a commercial contract, dependent wholly on the parties' ability to enter into a normal, commercial contract, just as a contract of sale or lease is simply and wholly a commercial contract.Like the law of sales and leases, in general, the right to contract is constrained by principles of unconscionability, good faith and fair dealing, UCITA has an additional restraint, an express power for a court to deny enforcement of a provision in a licensing contract that violates fundamental public policy. This public policy defense is unique in UCITA.Why is there a need for licensing contracts, rather than sale contracts for Computer information is peculiarly vulnerable to dissipation of its value by copying. The genius of computers is their ability to retain and copy information. Copies of information look just like their originals. In fact, everything is a copy. There are no true originals. Copies can be duplicated in

The Uniform Computer Information Transactions Act represents the first comprehensive uniform computer information licensing law. Determining which jurisdiction's law governs is an important issue in all commercial transactions. Its importance increases for commerce on the Internet which routinely spans state and national borders and involves many small companies or individuals. UCITA provides a uniform, coherent and understandable framework for determining applicable law that provides needed clarity, especially in Internet transactions. UCITA allows choice of an exclusive judicial forum, but only if the choice is not “unreasonable and unjust.” This gives courts a basis on which to invalidate abusive terms, but also recognizes that in a global, Internet economy, it is important for parties to be able to agree on where they can sue or be sued. This is especially important in information industries where the vast majority of all companies and commercial participants are small entities. UCITA has three rules that govern in the absence of agreement to the contrary:ⅰ) In an Internet transaction for electronic transfer of information, the transaction is governed by the law where the licensor is located. ⅱ) In a transaction for physical delivery of a tangible copy to a consumer, the governing law is the law of the state where the delivery was to be made. ⅲ) In all other cases, a transaction is governed by the law of the state with the most significant relationship to it. This rule adopted as a uniform approach in UCITA, while inexact, will eliminate the chaotic diversity that exists today.