It is that time of year when we look back to see what tech-law issues took up most of our time this year and look ahead to see what the emerging issues are for 2020. Data: The Issues of the Year Data presented a wide variety of challenging legal issues in 2019. Data is solidly … Continue Reading
With the online shopping season in full swing, the FTC decided that online retailers might benefit from a reminder as to the dos and don’ts for social media influencers. Thus, the FTC released a new guide, “Disclosures 101 for Social Media Influencers,” that reiterates its position about the responsibility of “influencers” to disclose “material” connections … Continue Reading
Last month, LinkedIn Corp. (“LinkedIn”) filed a petition for rehearing en banc of the Ninth Circuit’s blockbuster decision in hiQ Labs, Inc. v. LinkedIn Corp., No. 17-16783 (9th Cir. Sept. 9, 2019). The crucial question before the original panel concerned the scope of Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) liability to unwanted web scraping of publicly available social media … Continue Reading
On October 11, 2019, LinkedIn Corp. (“LinkedIn”) filed a petition for rehearing en banc of the Ninth Circuit’s blockbuster decision in hiQ Labs, Inc. v. LinkedIn Corp., No. 17-16783 (9th Cir. Sept. 9, 2019). The crucial question before the original panel concerned the scope of Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) liability to unwanted web … Continue Reading
UPDATE: On October 14, 2019, the parties entered into a Joint Stipulation dismissing the case, with prejudice. It appears from some reports that Stackla’s access to Facebook has been reinstated as part of the settlement. UPDATE: On September 27, 2019, the California district court issued its written order denying Stackla’s request for a TRO. In … Continue Reading
In a ruling that is being hailed as a victory for web scrapers and the open nature of publicly available website data, the Ninth Circuit today issued its long-awaited opinion in hiQ Labs, Inc. v. LinkedIn Corp., No. 17-16783 (9th Cir. Sept. 9, 2019). The crucial question before the court was whether once hiQ Labs, … Continue Reading
In the swirl of scrutiny surrounding the big Silicon Valley tech companies and with some in Congress declaiming that Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act (CDA) should be curtailed, 2019 has quietly been an important year for CDA jurisprudence with a number of opinions enunciating robust immunity under CDA Section 230. In particular, there … Continue Reading
In an important opinion, the Ninth Circuit affirmed a lower court’s ruling that plaintiffs in the ongoing Facebook biometric privacy class action have alleged a concrete injury-in-fact to confer Article III standing and that the class was properly certified. (Patel v. Facebook, Inc., No. 18-15982 (9th Cir. Aug. 8, 2019)). Given the California district court’s … Continue Reading
In recent years, there have been a number of suits filed in federal courts seeking to hold social media platforms responsible for providing material support to terrorists by allowing members of such groups to use social media accounts and failing to effectively block their content and terminate such accounts. As we’ve previously written about, such … Continue Reading
Three recent court decisions reaffirm the expansive immunity awarded to online providers that host third-party content under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act (“CDA”), 47 U.S.C. § 230(c): California’s Superior Court decision in Murphy v. Twitter, Inc., No. CGC-19-573712 (Cal. Super. June 12, 2019), and the Northern District of California’s decisions Brittain v. Twitter, … Continue Reading
Last month, a California district court granted a web-based service’s motion to compel arbitration of a putative class action brought by a user whose personal information was allegedly accessed in a massive 2016 data breach that involved 339 million user accounts. (Gutierrez v. FriendFinder Networks Inc., No. 18-05918 (N.D. Cal. May 3, 2019)). While the … Continue Reading
Last Friday, the Illinois Supreme Court ruled in the long-awaited Rosenbach case that an individual does not have to plead an actual injury or harm, apart from the statutory violation itself, in order to have statutory standing to sue under the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA). The Illinois Supreme Court ruling will allow procedural … Continue Reading
UPDATE: On January 22, 2019, the Supreme Court denied review of the California Supreme Court decision. In a closely-followed dispute, the California Supreme Court vacated a lower court order, based upon a default judgment in a defamation action, which had directed Yelp, Inc. (“Yelp”), a non-party to the original suit, to take down certain consumer … Continue Reading
As discussed in past posts about the long-running Facebook biometric privacy class action, users are challenging Facebook’s “Tag Suggestions” program, which scans for and identifies people in uploaded photographs for photo tagging. The class alleges that Facebook collected and stored their biometric data without prior notice or consent in violation of the Illinois Biometric Information … Continue Reading
Today, the President signed H.R. 1865, the “Allow States and Victims to Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act of 2017” (commonly known as “FOSTA”). The law is intended to limit the immunity provided under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act (“CDA Section 230”) for online services that knowingly host third-party content that promotes or facilitates … Continue Reading
UPDATE: On March 19, 2018, the district court granted the defendant’s motion for certification of the court’s February 15th partial summary judgment decision for interlocutory appeal to the Second Circuit. In allowing immediate appeal, the court agreed that its prior order “has created tremendous uncertainty for online publishers” and “given the frequency with which embedded … Continue Reading
UPDATE: On March 2, 2018, in a related biometric privacy litigation surrounding Tag Suggestions brought by non-users of Facebook, a California district court in a brief order declined to dismiss the action for lack of standing, citing its reasoning in the Patel opinion. (Gullen v. Facebook, Inc., No. 16-00937 (N.D. Cal. Mar. 2, 2018)). While … Continue Reading
UPDATE: On February 22, 2018, the district court granted 3taps’s motion to relate its action to the ongoing hiQ v. LinkedIn litigation. This motion was based upon a local Northern District of California rule that holds that cases should be related when the actions concern substantially the same parties, transaction or event, and there would … Continue Reading
Facebook recently announced that it would make changes to its news feed to prioritize content that users share and discuss and material from “reputable publishers.” These changes are part of what Mark Zuckerberg says is a refocusing of Facebook from “helping [users] find relevant content to helping [users] have more meaningful social interactions.” This refocus … Continue Reading
UPDATE: In a subsequent opinion, the court dismissed the plaintiffs’ third amended complaint. (See Gonzalez v. Google, Inc., 335 F.Supp.3d 1156 (N.D. Cal. 2018)). Following the reasoning of several past decisions, a California district court dismissed claims against Google under the Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA), 18 U.S.C. § 2333, for allegedly providing “material support” to ISIS by allowing … Continue Reading
This past week, the Supreme Court denied the petitions for certiorari in two noteworthy Ninth Circuit decisions that had interpreted the scope of liability under the federal Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) in the context of wrongful access of company networks by employees and in instances involving unwanted data scraping from publicly available websites. … Continue Reading
In a new development in an important scraping dispute, LinkedIn appealed the lower court’s decision to grant a preliminary injunction compelling LinkedIn to disable any technical measures it had employed to block the defendant’s data scraping activities. LinkedIn’s brief was filed on October 3, 2017. In it, LinkedIn asserts that the relevant issue is whether the lower … Continue Reading
A Green Light for Screen Scraping? Proceed With Caution… UPDATE: As expected, LinkedIn appealed the lower court’s decision to grant a preliminary injunction compelling LinkedIn to disable any technical measures it had employed to block the defendant’s data scraping activities. LinkedIn’s brief was filed on October 3, 2017. In it, LinkedIn asserts that the relevant … Continue Reading
UPDATE: In late October 2016, the parties notified the court that they were in discussions to settle the matter and would jointly stipulate to a dismissal of the action without prejudice. On November 2nd, the court dismissed the action. Title V of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, also known as the “Communications Decency Act of … Continue Reading
