Courts Says Employer’s Lawsuit Against Ex-Employee Over Retention and Use of Twitter Account can Proceed–PhoneDog v. Kravitz

[Post by Venkat Balasubramani] PhoneDog v. Kravitz, 2011 WL 5415612 (N.D. Ca.; Nov. 8, 2011) Another day, another post-employment dispute over a social media account. In this case, Noah Kravitz worked for PhoneDog, which is an “interactive mobile news and…

Yahoo Partially Defeats Lawsuit Over Wrongful Account Termination–Buza v. Yahoo

By Eric Goldman Buza v. Yahoo, Inc., 2011 WL 5041174 (N.D. Cal. Oct. 24, 2011). The complaint. Buza claims Yahoo terminated two GeoCities accounts related to his advocacy efforts. Buza is proceeding pro se, which is typical for user lawsuits…

Ex-Employee Converted Social Media/Website Passwords by Keeping Them From Her Employer–Ardis Health v. Nankivell

[Post by Venkat, with comments from Eric] Ardis Health, LLC, Curb Your Cravings, LLC and USA Herbals, LLC v. Ashleigh Nankivell, 2011 WL 4965172 (S.D.N.Y. Oct. 19, 2011) Nenkivell worked for CYC as a “video and social media producer.” Her…

Article on Bypassing Geographic Content Restrictions Using Borrowed IP Addresses

By Eric Goldman Marketa Trimble (UNLV Law) has posted a full copy of her article, The Future of Cybertravel: Legal Implications of the Evasion of Geolocation. I’ve highlighted this article before, such as in my coverage of the Internet Law…

In Facebook’s Lawsuit Against Alleged Spammer, Court Denies MaxBounty’s Motion to Dismiss

[Post by Venkat Balasubramani] Facebook v. MaxBounty, 10-Cv-04712 (N.D. Cal. Sept 14, 2011) Facebook is suing MaxBounty for allegedly running an affiliate network which dupes people into fanning Facebook pages, promoting the page to their friends, and signing up for…

Copyright Preempts State Tort Claims Over Loss of Control Over Website — 78th Infantry Div. v. Oprendek

[Post by Venkat Balasubramani] 78th Infantry Division, WWII Living History Ass’n v. Oprendek, 11-165 (D.N.J.; Aug 4, 2011) This is another web vendor dispute. Professor Goldman posted about one earlier this week. As in that case, here the parties did…

Web Vendor Dispute Gets Ugly–Ground Zero Museum v. Wilson

By Eric Goldman Ground Zero Museum Workshop v. Wilson, 2011 WL 3758582 (D. Md. Aug. 24, 2011) Disputes like these make me wonder if we can’t find some way to get along. Suson runs a non-profit museum focused on the…

Another Lawsuit over Flash Cookies Fails — Bose v. Interclick

[Post by Venkat Balasubramani, with comments from Eric] Bose v. Interclick, Inc., et al., 10-cv-09183-DAB (S.D.N.Y. Aug. 17, 2011) Bose sued Interclick, an advertising network, and various advertisers (including McDonald’s, Mazda and Microsoft) over “flash cookies” and “history sniffing.” As…

Court Finds That the Value of Bartered-For Services Constitutes Loss Under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act — Animators at Law v. Capital Legal Solutions

[Post by Venkat Balasubramani] Animators at Law, Inc. v. Capital Legal Solutions, 10cv1342 (E.D. Va.; May 10, 2011) This lawsuit presented an increasingly familiar fact pattern. Employees leave a company and the employer sues the ex-employees under the Computer Fraud…

No Computer Fraud and Abuse Act Violation for Access of Facebook and Personal Email by Employee — Lee v. PMSI

[Post by Venkat Balasubramani] Lee v. PMSI, 8:10 cv 2904 T 23TBM (M.D. Fla; May 6, 2011) I blogged last week about US v. Nosal, a Ninth Circuit case where the Ninth Circuit held that access of a computer in…