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

Mealey's Cyber Tech & E-Commerce

October 25, 2023
Panel Partly Reverses Denial Of Anti-SLAPP Motion Against OnlyFans Account Manager

LOS ANGELES — A California appellate panel partly reversed a trial court’s denial of a model’s anti-Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation (SLAPP) motion against her OnlyFans account’s former management company, which she accuses of violating California’s unfair competition law (UCL), after finding that the manager’s cross-claim applies to speech protected by litigation privilege.
October 25, 2023
Judge: Discovery Sought In Remanded WhatsApp Spyware Dispute Is Premature

OAKLAND, Calif. — In light of a pending dismissal motion and a lack of reciprocal discovery responses, a California federal judge on Oct. 24 denied an Israeli spyware firm’s request that WhatsApp Inc. be required to serve amended responses to its requests for admission (RFAs) in a lawsuit over alleged computer fraud.
October 24, 2023
2 Amici File Briefs Supporting Southwest In Worker’s Protected Speech Case

NEW ORLEANS — Two nonprofits filed separate amicus curiae briefs in the Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals supporting an airline’s arguments that a jury and trial court erred in finding that a flight attendant was fired for sending social media messages about abortion and in ordering the airline’s attorneys to attend religious liberty training from Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF); meanwhile, ADF filed its own amicus brief in support of neither side defending its ability to “provide comprehensive and professional legal training about the religious liberty requirements of Title VII” of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
October 23, 2023
High Court Stays Injunction On Biden’s Social Media Policies, Grants Certiorari

WASHINGTON, D.C. — An injunction preventing the federal government from influencing or coercing social media platforms in their content moderation decisions was stayed on Oct. 20 by a divided U.S. Supreme Court, which treated the government’s application to stay the injunction as a petition for certiorari to consider questions of state action, standing and First Amendment violations.
October 20, 2023
Roblox User Names, Serves 2nd Defendant In Defamation Suit For Tweets, Postings

ORLANDO, Fla. — In conjunction with a second amended complaint (SAC) in which she identified a second defendant in a lawsuit in Florida federal court over purportedly defamatory postings, a content creator on the Roblox online gaming platform issued a summons on Oct. 19 on the former Jane Doe defendant, who she said was identified through discovery subpoenas served on Roblox and Twitter Inc.
October 19, 2023
Google: UCL Plaintiffs Can’t Show Violations, Injury In Bard AI Chatbot Case

SAN FRANCISCO — Class action plaintiffs who complain that Google LLC trained artificial intelligence chatbot Bard on personal and copyrighted information trade “prolixity for precision,” fail to allege a privacy or property interest in material publicly posted on the internet and lack sufficient allegations that they read a privacy policy or can demonstrate an underlying statutory violation, the company says in a motion to dismiss unfair competition law (UCL), copyright and other claims filed in a California federal court.
October 17, 2023
2nd Circuit Won’t Rehear Appeal Of New York Times Auto Renewal Settlement

NEW YORK — A Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel denied a class settlement objector’s petition for rehearing or rehearing en banc after the appellate judges determined that a trial court employed the wrong legal standard when it approved a settlement between The New York Times and subscribers in a case over auto renewals and erred in finding that the access codes provided as part of the settlement were not coupons under the Class Action Fairness Act (CAFA) but reiterated the holding in Melito v. Experian Marketing Solutions, Inc. and ruled “that incentive awards are not per se unlawful.”
October 17, 2023
2nd Circuit: No Infringement By YouTube In User’s Posts Of Copyrighted Videos

NEW YORK — In an Oct. 17 summary order, a Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel found that a documentary maker did not establish any volitional conduct by YouTube LLC in the posting of purportedly infringing content by a channel owner, affirming a trial court’s dismissal of contributory and vicarious copyright infringement claims against the video-sharing platform operator.
October 17, 2023
Radio Host Parries ChatGPT Defamation Suit Challenges

ATLANTA — Recent Georgia Supreme Court precedent warrants finding that OpenAI LLC’s decision to register to do business in the state subjects it to jurisdiction, and the court should ignore the company’s references to material outside the complaint and deny a motion to dismiss, a man who claims that the company’s artificial intelligence defamed him says in an Oct. 16 opposition.
October 17, 2023
Pro Se Contributory Copyright Claim Against Kiwi Farms Reinstated

DENVER — A 10th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel on Oct. 16 said an author and songwriter’s allegations that the Kiwi Farms website contributed to infringement of his copyrighted works are adequate enough to withstand a motion to dismiss.
October 17, 2023
Amici To 5th Circuit: ISP Not Contributorily Liable For Customers’ File Sharing

NEW ORLEANS — Two trade organizations for internet service providers (ISPs) filed an amicus curiae brief in the Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals supporting an ISP that was hit with a $46.8 million contributory infringement judgment, in which they argue that the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent ruling in Twitter Inc. v. Taamneh, 598 U.S. 471 (2023), establishes that “a ‘communication provider’ [cannot] be held liable ‘merely for knowing that wrongdoers were using its services and failing to stop them.’”
October 16, 2023
Supreme Court Grants Certiorari In 2nd Challenge To Chevron Deference

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on Oct. 13 granted a petition for a writ of certiorari in a second case challenging the doctrine of Chevron deference and ordered that it be briefed on a schedule allowing argument “in tandem” with a pending case pertaining to the same issue, both of which involve challenges to regulations that require fishing vessels to pay federal monitors.
October 16, 2023
Draft Legislation Would Ban AI-Created Digital Replicas

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Draft legislation circulating in Congress would give individuals property rights over their likenesses and voices and ban unauthorized uses created by artificial intelligence.
October 13, 2023
Man Appeals Ruling That Copyright Can’t Protect AI Art

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A man found to have “put the cart before the horse” has appealed a holding by a District of Columbia federal judge that copyright law at its core historically requires a human creator and cannot protect art created by artificial intelligence (AI).
October 13, 2023
FTX Investor Says Competitor’s Tweets Caused ‘Collapse’ In Value

OAKLAND, Calif. — An investor in FTX Trading Ltd. filed a putative class action in California federal court accusing Binance Holdings Ltd., a competing cryptocurrency exchange, its affiliates and its CEO of violating securities laws and California’s unfair competition law (UCL) by selling off FTX tokens and tweeting negative statements about FTX that allegedly contributed to FTX’s “collapse.”
October 13, 2023
ChatGPT Makers Claim Writers’ Copyright Claims Inapplicable To AI Tech

SAN FRANCISCO — OpenAI Inc. and affiliated companies that developed the ChatGPT artificial intelligence (AI) program filed a reply in California federal court in support of their motion to dismiss two putative class actions for copyright infringement and other claims brought by copyright holders, urging the court to reject the plaintiffs’ “erroneous” theory “that every single output of ChatGPT is a prima facie copyright infringement.”
October 12, 2023
Federal Judge Dismisses Investor’s Complaint Over Alleged Online Misstatements

LOS ANGELES — A federal judge in California dismissed with prejudice the second amended complaint filed by a late investor’s daughter who continued to argue that a real estate company misled investors while seeking crowdfunding through social media statements after the investor’s death, finding that the daughter had failed to adequately plead falsity and that amending the complaint would be futile.
October 12, 2023
Judge Certifies Class Suing Company For Faking Reviews To Sell Shoddy Electronics

SAN FRANCISCO — A California federal magistrate judge granted a motion to certify a class accusing a California company ultimately owned by a Chinese manufacturer of violating California’s unfair competition law (UCL) and other laws by paying for fake reviews on Amazon.com to deceive consumers into buying its low-quality electronics.
October 12, 2023
N.Y. Federal Magistrate Judge: Copyright Owner Conceded Futility Of Case

BROOKLYN, N.Y. — A federal magistrate judge in New York said the voluntary dismissal with prejudice of allegations of copyright infringement by a copyright owner established knowledge that the claims were futile.
October 10, 2023
Judge Denies TRO Blocking Alleged Gambling App From Revising Terms To Moot Suit

LOS ANGELES — A California federal judge denied a putative class plaintiff’s application for a temporary restraining order (TRO) to stop an app company, which the plaintiff accuses of operating an illegal sports gambling game in violation of California’s unfair competition law (UCL), from revising its terms of use in a way that the plaintiff says would “retroactively” subject users to an arbitration agreement barring them from class membership.
October 10, 2023
Appellee Says Fake Cites, Wrong Court Rule Suggest Artificial Intelligence Use

SANTA ANA, Calif. — A case stands ready for California appellate review after a party told the court that incorrect case cites and references to a court rule that does not exist suggest that appellants challenging a receiver’s final report drafted a brief with artificial intelligence.
October 06, 2023
After Rehearing, 5th Circuit Panel Applies Social Media Coercion Injunction To CISA

NEW ORLEANS — One month after a Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel mostly upheld, and modified, a preliminary injunction barring certain federal government officials and entities from influencing social media platforms’ content moderation decisions, the same panel granted rehearing and issued a revised ruling in which it included the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) as one of the enjoined entities.
October 06, 2023
Judge Grants Final Approval To $10M Settlement In Roblox Digital Goods Suit

SAN FRANCISCO — A California federal judge on Oct. 5 granted final approval to a $10 million settlement to resolve putative class claims that will return more than half of “Robux” that 8 million users of the Roblox online video game lost when the game deleted in-game digital items the users had purchased, allegedly in violation of California’s unfair competition law (UCL).
October 06, 2023
Federal Judge Rejects SEC Bid For Interlocutory Appeal In Crypto Suit

NEW YORK — A New York federal judge denied a request from the Securities and Exchange Commission for interlocutory appeal in a case brought by the commission against a crypto asset firm it accused of selling cryptocurrencies without registering them as a security, finding that the SEC did not show that there was a substantial ground for difference of opinion
October 06, 2023
SEC Says Court Should Reject Coinbase’s Motion For Judgment On Crypto Case

NEW YORK — The Securities and Exchange Commission says that Coinbase Inc.’s motion for a judgment on the pleadings should be denied, arguing in a memorandum of law that Coinbase is asking the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York to rule that sales of cryptocurrency on its platform can never involve an investment contract because the SEC says this runs afoul of established tests to determine whether a product is a security.