Judge Koh Dismisses the Bulk of the Yahoo Email Scanning Class Action
Plaintiffs are non-Yahoo email users who sent messages to Yahoo users. They allege that Yahoo’s email scans violate federal and state wiretapping laws and invade their privacy. ECPA: This claim alleges that Yahoo “intercepts” the emails. ECPA is subject to…
Primer on European Union’s Right To Be Forgotten (Excerpt from My Internet Law Casebook) + Bonus Linkwrap
I haven’t yet written about the ECJ Right to Be Forgotten ruling directly, though I’ve already referenced it on the blog a few times. The ruling itself came out during a business trip when I was tied up, so I…
Minors’ Privacy Claims Against Viacom and Google Over Disclosure of Video Viewing Habits Dismissed
Plaintiffs alleged that Viacom and Google violated the Video Privacy Protection Act and other federal and state privacy laws by improperly collecting and passing along information when end users (kids) viewed videos or games at Viacom-owned websites (nick.com, nickjr.com, and…
Q2 2014 Quick Links, Part 3 (Privacy, Marketing, E-Commerce & More)
Privacy * Snapchat’s basic value proposition (“Disappearing digital photos”) has been deceptive from the beginning. The FTC busted them for it. (I saw James Grimmelmann added this to his Internet Law casebook. We’ve also added it to our Advertising Law…
Lawsuit Over Google’s Unified Privacy Policy Pared Down, But Two Claims Survive
This is a lawsuit against Google for “commingling user data across different Google products.” Under the policy in effect before March 2012, information collected in one particular Google product was not automatically combined with information from another product. This changed…
Criminal Cyberbullying Statute Violates First Amendment–New York v. Marquan
Albany County enacted a criminal cyberbulling statute, which defined cyberbulling as: any act of communicating or causing a communication to be sent by mechanical or electronic means, including posting statements on the internet or through a computer or email network,…
Stalking Conviction For Friending a Prosecutor’s Facebook Friends?–State v. Moller
Online stalking and threats are hot topics today, especially in light of the Supreme Court granting cert in US v. Elonis (we plan to recap that case before oral arguments). Today’s case highlights the grey area between veiled threats and…
The Supreme Court’s Riley Decision Won’t Change Much In The Field (Guest Blog Post)
[Eric’s Note: This guest blog post is from my colleague Kyle Graham, who teaches and writes in the area of Criminal Procedure, Evidence and others. I’m pleased to share his expert take on the Riley ruling, followed by a few…
Email Harvesting: Repeated Emails From LinkedIn May Violate Publicity Rights
This is a lawsuit alleging that LinkedIn improperly mined users’ contact lists and sent them repeated invitation emails. While Judge Koh eliminated the Stored Communications Act and California anti-hacking statute claims, a chunk of the lawsuit remains. Harvesting contact lists…
Revenge Porn/Cyberstalking Conviction Doesn’t Violate First Amendment–US v. Osinger
V.B. and Osinger had a relationship. When it terminated, he continued to contact her in a variety of ways (email, text, etc.). They originally lived in Illinois, but V.B. moved to California, where she accepted a job. Before she moved,…