Q1 2009 Quick Links, Part 4

By Eric Goldman Security * Massachusetts Data Security regulations were amended. * In Facebook v. Power.com, Facebook brought another lawsuit to block extraction of user data from the site (similar to the Facebook v. ConnectU lawsuit). Venkat, Masnick, News.com, NYT,…

CLRB Hanson v. Google Preliminarily Settles for $20M

By Eric Goldman CLRB Hanson Industries v. Google, 5:05-cv-03649-JW (settlement papers filed March 26, 2009). The new case filings: * The settlement motion * The settlement agreement * The proposed court order granting the settlement My previous blog coverage of…

Facebook User Agreement Imbroglio Recap (and Some Comments of My Own)

By Eric Goldman I didn’t have a chance to blog on the Facebook user agreement amendment flap in real-time, but now that Facebook has rolled back its amendments and everyone is catching their breath, the Monday morning quarterbacking is proceeding…

2008 Cyberlaw Year-in-Review

By Eric Goldman It’s a sign of my schedule that I’m just now getting to this, and this post will be more pithy than I initially conceived. This post recaps some of the Cyberlaw highlights from last year. Frankly, the…

Publisher Promising “Visitors” Owes “Visitors,” Not “Unique Visitors”–WebMD v. RDA

By Eric Goldman WebMD, LLC v. RDA Intern., Inc., 2009 WL 175036 (N.Y. Sup. Ct. Jan. 6, 2009) It’s been a while since I’ve blogged about a lawsuit between an Internet publisher and advertiser, so you may enjoy this one….

The [Non]enforceability of Privacy Promises–Pinero v. Jackson Hewitt

A recent court case reiterates that privacy policies aren’t the be-all, end-all panacea for protecting online privacy. By Ethan Ackerman One of the main arguments against a federal online privacy law has been that website privacy policies were a self-regulatory…

AOL Loses Venue Selection Dispute in Ninth Circuit Due to an Unfortunate “Of”–Doe 1 v. AOL

By Eric Goldman Doe 1 v. AOL LLC, 2009 WL 103657 (9th Cir. Jan. 16, 2009) This is one of several lawsuits against AOL over AOL’s 2006 posting of a database of improperly anonymized search queries. This particular lawsuit was…

Oracle v. SAP Updates–Third Amended Complaint, Motion to Dismiss Ruling, SAP’s Latest Answer

By Eric Goldman There have been some recent developments in the high-stakes and complicated Oracle v. SAP lawsuit. In October, Oracle filed its third amended complaint whereby it expanded its efforts to show that SAP America and SAP Germany were…

Doe v. SexSearch Affirmed by 6th Circuit, But Not on 230 Grounds

By Eric Goldman Doe v. SexSearch.com, 2008 WL 5396830 (6th Cir. Dec. 30, 2008) I previously summarized this case as follows: Defendants operate a website that helps people hook up to have sex. Roe posted a profile saying that she…

Google’s Latest Attempt to Kill the CLRB Hanson Lawsuit Fails

By Eric Goldman CLRB Hanson Industries, LLC v. Google, Inc., NO. C 05-03649 JW (N.D. Cal. Dec. 16, 2008) CLRB v. Google is the long-running lawsuit (3 1/2 years and counting) over Google’s adherence to advertising limits that advertisers set…