The Long-Term Promise of Privacy Federalism, Part 2

The Long-Term Promise of Privacy Federalism, Part 2

Yesterday, guest blogger Bilyana Petkova summarized some of her arguments in favor of “privacy federalism,” i.e., temporary state-level regulation of privacy matters, a topic she addresses more fully in a forthcoming article on SSRN. In helping her prepare her post,…

The Long-Term Promise of Privacy Federalism, Part 1 (Guest Blog Post)

The Long-Term Promise of Privacy Federalism, Part 1 (Guest Blog Post)

[Eric’s introduction: as I’ve remarked previously, the academic and policy discourse about privacy focuses principally on the substantive legal boundaries of privacy law and pays comparatively little attention on which policymakers are best positioned to develop and supervise those rules. The…

Judge Expresses Frustration With Overbroad Discovery Requests for Social Media Evidence--Farley v. Callais

Judge Expresses Frustration With Overbroad Discovery Requests for Social Media Evidence–Farley v. Callais

As we’ve discussed before, social media accounts are honeypots in litigation; they are irresistible data sources as an encapsulation of a person’s life. As a result, it’s become routine for litigators to seek massive amounts of social media evidence in…

AARP Defeats Lawsuit for Sharing Information With Facebook and Adobe

AARP Defeats Lawsuit for Sharing Information With Facebook and Adobe

Plaintiff sued AARP alleging that AARP violated its privacy policy (link to policy effective April 2015) by allowing Adobe and Facebook to collect PII about plaintiff. The court says there’s not a sufficient allegation of violation of AARP’s privacy policy…

9th Circuit Rejects VPPA Claims Against Netflix For Intra-Household Disclosures

9th Circuit Rejects VPPA Claims Against Netflix For Intra-Household Disclosures

Plaintiffs sued Netflix under the Video Privacy Protection Act for Netflix’s display of a subscriber’s queue and recommendation list on televisions connected to the subscriber’s account. In other words, if a household is sitting around in front of a television that accesses someone’s…

Seventh Circuit: Data Breach Victims Have Standing Based on Future Harm

Seventh Circuit: Data Breach Victims Have Standing Based on Future Harm

Plaintiffs sued Neiman Marcus on behalf of a putative class alleging claims arising out of a 2013 data breach. Neiman Marcus informed its customers (in 2014) that an attack had occurred and 350,000 cards had been exposed. Neiman Marcus first…

Q2 2015 Quick Links, Part 2 (Censorship and More)

Q2 2015 Quick Links, Part 2 (Censorship and More)

Content Regulation * Oxera: The economic impact of safe harbours on Internet intermediary start-ups * South Korea is mandating that all cellphones sold to minors have an app called “Smart Sheriff” that censors their online experience. What could possibly go…

eBay Must Disclose User Identities In Response To 512(h) Subpoenas

eBay Must Disclose User Identities In Response To 512(h) Subpoenas

Barry Rosen is a photographer (especially of dogs) and repeat copyright enforcer (see, e.g., our previous coverage of his litigation here and here). His lawsuit against eBay produced an interesting 512 safe harbor ruling earlier this year. Meanwhile, eBay and…

LinkedIn's “Reference Search” Service Doesn't Violate Fair Credit Reporting Act--Sweet v. LinkedIn

LinkedIn’s “Reference Search” Service Doesn’t Violate Fair Credit Reporting Act–Sweet v. LinkedIn

Plaintiffs alleged that potential employers found references about them through LinkedIn’s Reference Searches functions, they were denied employment as a result, and thus LinkedIn violated the Fair Credit Reporting Act. LinkedIn users, including prospective employers, generally can search LinkedIn user…

Q4 2014 & Q1 2015 Quick Links Part 3 (Facebook)

Q4 2014 & Q1 2015 Quick Links Part 3 (Facebook)

* AP: Facebook Tells DEA To Stop Operating Fake Profile Pages. Really, that even needs to be said??? Facebook’s letter. WSJ Law Blog: U.S. to Pay Woman $134,000 for Impersonating Her on Facebook * What do people mean when they “like”…