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

Mealey's Cyber Tech & E-Commerce

May 31, 2024
Putative Class Suit Filed Against Ticketmaster For Hack Of 560M Customers’ Data

LOS ANGELES — Two consumers filed a putative class action in California federal court against Ticketmaster LLC and Live Nation Entertainment Inc. accusing them of negligence and violation of California’s unfair competition law (UCL) for not protecting the data of approximately 560 million customers that was allegedly stolen from its servers in a recent hack.
May 31, 2024
Adult Entertainers Denied Motion To Drop Their Claims Against Meta, OnlyFans

SAN FRANCISCO — Citing the “time and effort” expended in a putative class action alleging tortious interference and unfair competition by Meta Platforms Inc. in blacklisting social media posts by most adult entertainment (AE) providers in favor of the OnlyFans AE platform, a California federal judge denied a motion by the three lead AE performer plaintiffs to dismiss their suit due to an inability to achieve class certification under the Class Action Fairness Act (CAFA).
May 30, 2024
Judge Certifies Privacy, Publicity Rights Class Action Against Data Aggregator

SAN FRANCISCO — A California federal judge on May 29 granted a group of plaintiffs’ motion to certify a class action against a personal information data-aggregator website on behalf of two statewide classes accusing the company of violating plaintiffs’ rights of publicity and against misappropriation of name and likeness and denied the parties’ competing motions to exclude each other’s experts.
May 28, 2024
ISP Tells 4th Circuit Labels’ Misconduct Merits Relief, Discovery In Copyright Row

RICHMOND, Va. — An internet service provider (ISP), which was found liable for its subscribers’ infringing behavior in downloading copyrighted songs, entreaties the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals to find that it was wrongly deprived of the opportunity to conduct additional discovery and seek relief from the infringement judgment after it was discovered that the plaintiff record labels engaged in discovery misconduct by withholding and misrepresenting evidence from their investigation firm that was used against the ISP at trial.
May 23, 2024
High Court: Courts Decide Which Competing Contracts, Arbitration Clauses Govern

WASHINGTON, D.C. — In a situation where parties have agreed to competing contracts or arbitration clauses regarding how to resolve claims in a dispute, it is a court’s job to decide which contract governs, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled May 23 in a suit between a cryptocurrency exchange and a group of its users.
May 22, 2024
Bankruptcy Judge OKs Crypto Company’s $2B Settlement With New York AG

WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. — A federal bankruptcy judge in New York approved a settlement between bankrupt cryptocurrency platforms and the New York Attorney General’s Office (NYAG) that will resolve claims that the platforms defrauded investors out of billions of dollars; the settlement creates a victim’s fund that will receive up to $2 billion of the platforms’ remaining assets.
May 20, 2024
High Court Won’t Consider Copyright Discovery Rule In Online Photo Use Row

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Hearst Newspapers LLC’s plea that the U.S. Supreme Court settle the application of the atextual discovery rule to the Copyright Act fell on deaf ears, as the high court in its May 20 order list denied the media company’s petition for certiorari in a dispute over its use of a photographer’s copyrighted photographs on the websites of several of its publications.
May 16, 2024
Record Companies Beat Motion To Dismiss; Copyright Claims Over Digitization Proceed

SAN FRANCISCO — Entities at the helm of the “Great 78 Project” — an initiative dedicated to converting 78 rpm records into digital format and then making the recordings available online for free — were denied dismissal of copyright infringement allegations leveled against them by various recording companies by a federal judge in California on May 15.
May 16, 2024
D.C. Circuit Merges TikTok’s, Creators’ 1st Amendment Suits Over Nationwide Ban

WASHINGTON, D.C. — One day after a group of TikTok creators filed a petition for review of the newly passed federal law that promises to ban the popular social network absent a corporate ownership change, the District of Columbia Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on May 15 consolidated the suit with a similar suit filed a week earlier by TikTok Inc., which also challenges the statute’s validity under the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
May 15, 2024
Federal Judge Narrowly Vacates Securities Claims Dismissal After Reconsideration

PHOENIX — A federal judge in Arizona on May 14 vacated portions of a previous order dismissing a putative securities class complaint brought by retirement funds alleging that an online home-selling company made false statements about its artificial-intelligence-powered pricing algorithm, finding that the retirement funds adequately showed that an allegedly misleading statement about the algorithm relates to the funds’ alleged losses.
May 15, 2024
Chamber Of Commerce Backs 9th Circuit Rehearing In Meta Advertising Fraud Row

SAN FRANCISCO — In affirming the certification of a damages class in a suit alleging fraudulent misrepresentation and concealment by Meta Platforms Inc. related to its online advertising services, a Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel majority weakened the requirements for class certification in fraud cases, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce says in an amicus curiae brief supporting Meta’s bid for rehearing on this “issue of exceptional importance.”
May 14, 2024
11th Circuit Vacates Class Settlement, Attorney Fees In GoDaddy TCPA Suit

ATLANTA — A trial court abused its discretion when it approved a Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) settlement between a class and GoDaddy.com LLC providing cash or vouchers as it failed to consider amendments to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23(e)(2), overlooked evidence that the agreement was reached through collusion, failed to properly inform absent class members and miscalculated attorney fees, an 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel ruled May 13.
May 14, 2024
Insurer Has No Duty To Defend, Indemnify Bitcoin Theft Suit, 5th Circuit Affirms

NEW ORLEANS — The Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on May 13 affirmed a lower federal court’s ruling in favor of an insurer in its lawsuit disputing coverage for an underlying lawsuit alleging that insureds conspired to steal bitcoin through a malware attack, finding that the underlying action alleges only intentional acts that are not covered.
May 14, 2024
ACLU, NetChoice, Tribes File Briefs Opposing Montana TikTok Ban

SAN FRANCISCO — Nonprofit civil liberties organizations, an online business trade association and a Native American tribe are among those that filed nine amicus curiae briefs in the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals opposing a presently enjoined Montana law that would ban the TikTok social network within the state, raising arguments of federal jurisdiction, free speech rights and tribal sovereignty.
May 14, 2024
Judge Orders Discovery In Bid To Enforce $1.5M Award Against Bankrupt German CEO

SAN JOSE, Calif. — A California federal judge refused to dismiss a video game streaming platform’s petition to confirm a JAMS award worth nearly $1.5 million against two German entities and their shareholder, the former CEO of the original award-debtor, and ordered further jurisdictional discovery to determine whether the court can exercise jurisdiction over the German defendants.
May 14, 2024
Kiwi Farms Operator Can’t Persuade High Court To Hear Copyright Case

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on May 13 said it won’t weigh in on a reversal by the 10th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals of a Utah federal judge’s decision that dismissed copyright infringement claims leveled against the owner and operator of the Kiwi Farms website.
May 13, 2024
Supreme Court Rejects Petition Over Apple’s ‘Censorship Of Software’

WASHINGTON, D.C. — After twice denying an application for a writ of injunction by the creator of a coronavirus tracking app, which Apple Inc. declined to carry in its App Store, the U.S. Supreme Court on May 13 denied the creator’s petition for certiorari in which it raised seven questions related to Apple Inc.’s purported anticompetitive behavior.
May 10, 2024
9th Circuit Says Plaintiffs In Loot Box Gambling Suit Failed To Allege Injury

SAN FRANCISCO — A Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel on May 9 found that two video game players who brought California unfair competition law (UCL) claims against a Finnish developer for illegal gambling based on in-game “loot box” sales lacked standing due to failure to allege a cognizable injury.
May 10, 2024
Data Scraper Prevails In Spat With X Corp., Judge Finds Copyright Preemption

SAN FRANCISCO — Dismissal in full, with leave to amend, was granted May 9 in a breach of contract and unfair competition action by X Corp., with a federal judge in California declaring that “the extent to which public data may be freely copied from social media platforms, even under the banner of scraping, should generally be governed by the Copyright Act,” and not by “conflicting, ubiquitous” terms of use.
May 09, 2024
Ad Customers Accuse Reddit Of ‘Click-Through Fraud’ In Class Complaint

SAN FRANCISCO — A tech company on May 8 filed a putative class action in California federal court against Reddit Inc., operator of a popular social media platform, accusing it of violating California’s unfair competition law (UCL) and breach of contract by allegedly charging fraudulent fees per click on digital advertisements to it and other companies while allowing fraudulent clicks on its platform.
May 09, 2024
6th Circuit Reverses Dismissal Of Trademark Case On Jurisdiction Grounds

CINCINNATI — Findings by a Tennessee federal judge that his court lacks jurisdiction over an Arizona-based trademark infringement defendant were reversed May 8 by a divided Sixth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, which said “longstanding precedent establishes that a company’s choice to welcome customers from and regularly sell products into a state subjects the company to that state’s jurisdiction.”
May 09, 2024
Doe Victims Tell 9th Circuit Twitter Isn’t Immune From Sex-Trafficking Claims

SAN FRANCISCO — On their second appeal before the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, two John Does who were featured in child sexual abuse material (CSAM) that was posted and distributed on Twitter contend in an opening appellant brief that their sex-trafficking, child pornography and negligence claims were wrongly dismissed as barred by Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act (CDA) because their claims were based on Twitter Inc.’s own actions and not on treating the social network operator as the publisher or speaker of the CSAM, which was posted by third parties.
May 08, 2024
Judgment Entered Dismissing UCL Suit Against OnlyFans For Automatic Renewals

LOS ANGELES — A California federal judge on May 7 entered judgment dismissing a putative class action against two entities that own and operate the adult entertainment website OnlyFans after granting a motion to dismiss claims that the company violated California’s unfair competition law (UCL) by failing to notify subscribers that they would be automatically charged monthly for subscriptions to various OnlyFans models.
May 08, 2024
Discretionary Denial Of Apple Petitions Warranted, Patent Owner Asserts

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — Infringement litigation in Texas federal court over several fraud detection patents is too far along to institute inter partes review (IPR), the patent owner told the Patent Trial and Appeal Board on May 7, urging a discretionary denial of the challenges to its technology by Apple Inc.
May 08, 2024
TikTok Sues Over ‘Obviously Unconstitutional’ Law Banning Its Platform In U.S.

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Making good on recent public statements that it would challenge a newly enacted federal law targeting the operation of its popular social media platform in the United States, TikTok Inc. on May 7 filed a petition for review in which it asks the District of Columbia Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals to deem the new law unconstitutional and to enjoin it from being enforced.