Mealey's Cyber Tech & E-Commerce : Mealey's : Legal News & Analysis

Mealey's Cyber Tech & E-Commerce

May 03, 2024
On Remand, Judge Dismisses Putative Class Action Against Google For Banner Ads

SAN JOSE, Calif. — On remand from the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, a federal judge in California dismissed with prejudice putative class claims brought against Google LLC by two website owners for violation of California’s unfair competition law (UCL) and other laws in relation to Google’s former practice on its Android search app of superimposing its logo and a “Related Pages” banner on the plaintiffs’ websites, which featured links to competitors’ websites.
May 03, 2024
Judge Denies Letter Rogatory To Name ‘Civil Society’ Members Targeted By Spyware

OAKLAND, Calif. — A spyware maker’s attempt to demonstrate that its surveillance software targeted terrorists and criminals, rather than members of “civil society,” can be made without obtaining discovery from a research lab, a California federal judge ruled May 2, denying the defendant’s motion to issue a letter rogatory on the nonparty Canadian entity while seeking to defend itself from computer fraud claims brought by WhatsApp Inc.
May 03, 2024
Production, Brief Ordered In Nonparty Discovery Disputes In Apple Antitrust Suit

SAN FRANCISCO — In response to recently filed briefs concerning discovery plaintiffs seek from two nonparties in their iPhone app monopolization class action against Apple Inc., a California federal magistrate judge issued an order partly granting their motion to compel certain records from app developer Rocket Money, while addressing the company’s concerns about discovery burdens and protecting the confidentiality of its records.
May 03, 2024
City Manager, Critic Ordered To Brief 6th Circuit On Social Media State Action Test

CINCINNATI — The parties in a dispute over when a public official’s social media use constitutes state action were ordered by the Sixth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals to submit briefs discussing how the U.S. Supreme Court’s recently issued state action test in the remanded suit affects the appeals court's previous ruling or the standard it should use in the future.
May 03, 2024
Discovery Sought In Abuse Suit Against Care Home Over Demeaning Snapchat Videos

LEWISBURG, Pa. — The attorney-in-fact for a resident of a personal care home moved a Pennsylvania state court to compel discovery in a negligence suit against the care home, related entities, administrators and staff, alleging that the care-dependent resident incurred abuse when staff purportedly posed the resident and took photos and videos of her that were uploaded to Snapchat “for no legitimate reason other than to demean” her.
May 02, 2024
Judge Dismisses Consumer’s UCL Suit Against Herbal Cough Drop Maker

SAN JOSE, Calif. — A California federal judge granted a cough drop maker’s motion for judgment on the pleadings and dismissed without prejudice a putative class action filed against it by a consumer who claimed that it deceptively advertises its cough drops as offering herbal and medicinal benefits in violation of California’s unfair competition law (UCL).
May 02, 2024
9th Circuit Orders Briefing In Remanded Social Media Blocking Suit

PASADENA, Calif. — Complying with a directive from the U.S. Supreme Court in a dispute over freedom of speech implications related to being banned from a public official’s social media page, a Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel ordered the parties in the remanded lawsuit to submit briefs on the impact of the high court’s ruling in a parallel case on the present suit.
May 02, 2024
Officer’s ‘Hateful’ Facebook Posts Violated Public Policy, Pennsylvania Panel Rules

PHILADELPHIA — Reversing an arbitrator’s award that reinstated a police officer to his position on a university’s patrol, a Pennsylvania appeals court panel on May 1 found that the Facebook posts for which he was fired violated dominant public policy against discrimination, making his termination not without just cause and, therefore, not in violation of the governing collective bargaining agreement (CBA).
May 01, 2024
Individual Settlement Reached In Papa John’s Website Data Collection Class Suit

SAN DIEGO — A consumer who filed a putative class complaint accusing Papa John’s International Inc. of violating the California Invasion of Privacy Act (CIPA) through the interception and collection of users’ data on a pizza-ordering webpage filed a notice in a federal court in California stating that he reached an individual settlement.
May 01, 2024
Website Owner Asks High Court About Scope Of Contributory Copyright Infringement

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The owner and operator of the Kiwi Farms website, who was found liable for contributory infringement over site users’ posting of copyrighted materials, tells the U.S. Supreme Court in a petition for certiorari that the 10th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals’ ruling improperly expanded secondary liability by holding that receiving a takedown notice sufficiently establishes knowledge of infringement meriting action by a site operator.
April 30, 2024
FTC Seeks Evidence Of Amazon’s Use Of Self-Destructing Messages In Antitrust Suit

SEATTLE — Asserting that Amazon.com Inc. executives, including Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos, have been discussing “sensitive business matters,” including the present monopolization lawsuit against it, via an encrypted-messaging app that “irrevocably destroys messages,” the Federal Trade Commission filed a motion in Washington federal court seeking to compel the online retailer to produce any corporate documents related to “preservation notices and its instructions about the use of ephemeral messaging applications.”
April 30, 2024
Roblox Moves To Dismiss Or Arbitrate ‘Child Labor’ Claims In Class Action Suit

SAN FRANCISCO — The online gaming company Roblox Corp. filed motions in a California federal court to dismiss and compel arbitration of claims brought against it by parents of Roblox players who accuse it of violating California’s unfair competition law (UCL) by designing its game to addict kids and allegedly profiting off of a “child labor market” wherein minor users perform online tasks in return for Robux.
April 29, 2024
Chipmaker Urges 9th Circuit To Affirm Dismissal Of Consumers’ UCL Claims

SAN FRANCISCO — A modem chipmaker on April 26 filed an appellee brief in the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals urging the court to find that consumers’ putative class claims against it for violating antitrust laws and California’s unfair competition law (UCL) were properly dismissed.
April 29, 2024
Google Search Antitrust Judge Unseals Some Court Records For New York Times

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The New York Times Co. was partly successful in its ongoing effort to obtain unsealed versions of court documents in the government’s antitrust lawsuit against Google Inc., when a District of Columbia federal judge issued a document-by-document ruling directing the parties and two nonparties to provide unredacted versions of certain documents related to Google’s agreements that purportedly contributed to its dominance in the internet search engine market.
April 26, 2024
Panel Affirms Dismissal Of Fortnite Purchasers’ UCL, Antitrust Claims Against Apple

SAN JOSE, Calif. —A California appellate panel on April 25 affirmed a trial court’s dismissal of two consumers’ claims against Apple Inc. for removing the game “Fortnite” from its App Store and allegedly monopolizing the app market and artificially increasing prices on apps for users of its devices in violation of California’s unfair competition law (UCL) and the state’s antitrust law.
April 25, 2024
9th Circuit Issues Mandate In 3 Social Media Terror-Aiding Suits

SAN FRANCISCO — Three weeks after it affirmed the dismissal of three lawsuits in which terror victims’ family members alleged violation of the Antiterrorism Act (ATA) by social media platform operators, the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on April 24 issued a mandate announcing that the judgment has taken effect.
April 24, 2024
Parties In WhatsApp Spyware Suit Argue Whether Letter Rogatory Is Appropriate

OAKLAND, Calif. — WhatsApp Inc., NSO Group Technologies Limited and a nonparty research lab filed briefs in California federal court disputing whether discovery NSO seeks to obtain from the lab via a letter rogatory is relevant, appropriate or necessary to the computer fraud claims at the heart of the lawsuit over the defendant’s spyware.
April 24, 2024
Copyright, Trademark, Trade Dress Case Against TikTok Will Largely Proceed

SAN FRANCISCO — Although a motion to dismiss by TikTok Inc. was partly granted April 23, the copyright, trademark and trade dress claims by a China-based company can be repleaded in a fourth amended complaint (FAC), a federal judge in California ruled.
April 22, 2024
Federal Judge Stays Class Action Alleging Insurer Illegally Wiretaps Website Users

PHILADELPHIA — A Pennsylvania federal judge granted an insurer’s motion to stay a putative class action alleging that it illegally wiretaps website users by using third-party session replay software to track and record their navigation, exercising “its considerable discretion to stay these proceedings pending guidance from the Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals regarding standing” in what the insurer calls a “strikingly similar” lawsuit.
April 19, 2024
Bank Of America Beats Trademark Claims By Search Engine Operator

DENVER — Almost three years after reinstating a trademark infringement action against Bank of America Corp. (BofA), the 10th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on April 18 affirmed a Colorado federal judge’s decision on remand to again reject the allegations.
April 18, 2024
Judge Won’t Rethink Dismissal Ruling In GitHub AI Copyright Suit

OAKLAND, Calif. — Five Doe defendants who claim that they did not receive proper attribution for use of their licensed materials on GitHub Inc.’s online collaboration platform failed in their quest for reconsideration of dismissal of their claims under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) when a California federal judge ruled that they did not “show reasonable diligence in bringing the motion” and did not establish any of the prerequisites for justifying reconsideration.
April 17, 2024
Apple, Plaintiffs, App Makers Differ On Discovery Issues In IPhone Antitrust Suit

SAN FRANCISCO — In a trio of discovery letter briefs filed in California federal court, Apple Inc., a class of consumers and a nonparty app developer bicker over the relevance of the plaintiffs’ discovery requests related to notification of the recently certified class and the merits of the class monopolization claims against Apple.
April 16, 2024
Epic Games Proposes Injunction To Stop Google’s Monopolistic Practices

SAN FRANCISCO — Four months after a California federal jury found that Google Inc. engaged in anticompetitive conduct, tying and restraint of trade related to distribution of and payment for Android apps, plaintiff Epic Games Inc. filed a proposed permanent injunction in which it suggests that Google be prevented from engaging in various agreements, incentives and downloading and installation practices, among other things, for the purpose of making the relevant app markets competitive.
April 16, 2024
Massachusetts High Court Considers When A Party Is On Notice Of Online Misuse

BOSTON — Requiring a group of models to police even the most obscure portions of the internet for potential misappropriation of their images is “a little bit of a needle in a haystack problem,” the justices of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court said during oral arguments, as they wrestled over a question of whether social media posts are “inherently unknowable” in the context of triggering the statute of limitations of the discovery rule for defamation and publicity rights claims.
April 15, 2024
Corrected Judgment Entered After $525M Awarded In Patent Case

CHICAGO — A federal judge in Illinois on April 12 entered a corrected judgment two days after jurors awarded a plaintiff $525 million in damages for infringement by Amazon Web Services Inc. of three information storage and retrieval patents.