Web Scraping for Me, But Not for Thee (Guest Blog Post)
…the primary legal theory that was used to deter web scraping was the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act or the CFAA. The CFAA prohibits accessing a “protected computer” without authorization….
Announcing the 2023 Edition of My Internet Law Casebook
…portions) and the Hamidi ruling. These are all 20 years old and don’t really represent the core doctrines today. This means I am actively seeking a CFAA/scraping case that can…
Chegg Is Likely to Prevail on Its Anti-Scraping Contracts Claim…But Doesn’t Get an Injunction–Chegg v. Doe (Guest Blog Post)
…counts! Score one win for the crafty scraper! (for now…) CFAA claims Chegg brought a CFAA claim against the defendant because: 1) its data is behind a log-in screen; 2)…
Contractual Control over Information Goods after ML Genius v. Google (Guest Blog Post)
…Ninth Circuit, in a much-celebrated opinion, rejected LinkedIn CFAA’s claim, stressing the public nature of the information that was scraped. But a few months later, in a much less high-profile…
The 9th Circuit Keeps Trying to Ruin Cybersecurity–Enigma v. Malwarebytes
…intent to gain unauthorized access to a computer for some nefarious purpose.” NOT HELPFUL. What constitutes “unauthorized access” is itself a jurisprudential morass (see, e.g., every CFAA ruling since Van…
After hiQ Labs, Is Scraping Public Data Legal? (Guest Blog Post)
…Circuit on the CFAA claims, where the court said, twice: Although there are significant public interests on both sides, the district court properly determined that, on balance, the public interest…
Hello, You’ve Been Referred Here Because You’re Wrong About Web Scraping Laws (Guest Blog Post, Part 2 of 2)
…or implied that the CFAA is the only law that governs web scraping The CFAA is the most frequently litigated legal issue with web scraping, at least historically. And because…
As Everyone Expected Years Ago, hiQ’s CFAA Wins Don’t Mean It Can Freely Scrape–hiQ v. LinkedIn (Guest Blog Post, Part 1 of 2)
…hiQ’s CFAA “victories” mean nothing if it loses the breach of contract ruling. Either contracts or the CFAA is sufficient to stop hiQ’s scraping. hiQ had to win all of…
Does the CFAA Help Airlines Control Their Distribution Channels?–RyanAir v. Booking (Guest Blog Post)
…CFAA liability; 2) Even if this conduct were sufficient to trigger direct CFAA liability, the CFAA does not provide for vicarious liability. The District Court of Delaware mostly denied Booking’s…
Section 230 Protect Apple’s App Store from Claims Over Cryptocurrency Theft–Diep v. Apple
…allegedly committed the CFAA violation, not the app store–but it’s still a provocative and possibly unprecedented ruling. As a practical matter, I don’t believe there’s a “secondary” claim for CFAA…