Newsletter RSS

Mealey's Cyber Tech & E-Commerce

  • June 07, 2023

    Video Game Company To 2nd Circuit: Stockholder Failed To Plead Loss Causation

    NEW YORK — A former stockholder and former owner of American Depository Shares (ADS) who accused a video game company in a putative class complaint of committing securities fraud when taking the company private failed to sufficiently plead loss causation, the company argues in an appellee brief filed in the Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals.

  • June 06, 2023

    Parties Brief Dismissal In AI Lending Platform Securities Class Action

    CINCINNATI — Optimistic statements about how an artificial intelligence lending platform would perform cannot form the basis of a securities class action, and the class never shows that the alleged misrepresentations were false, let alone false when they were made, defendants argue in a pair of reply briefs in support of motions to dismiss filed in an Ohio federal court.

  • June 06, 2023

    Lawyer Cites ChatGPT Responses In Declaration Supporting Attorney Fees

    NEW YORK — An attorney in a federal court in New York supported his claim for fees by citing a conversation he had with artificial intelligence ChatGPT, saying in part that it was important to know what consumers with access to the technology would expect to pay.

  • June 06, 2023

    Amended Settlement In Grubhub Faulty Info Class Suit Preliminarily Approved

    DENVER — A federal judge in Colorado granted preliminary approval to a class settlement providing injunctive relief in a lawsuit accusing Grubhub Inc. of deceiving consumers by offering faulty information regarding restaurants that did not partner with it after the parties amended the agreement to state that claims for disgorgement of profits under the Lanham Act were not released.

  • June 06, 2023

    9th Circuit Again Revives Antivirus Firm’s False Advertising Suit Against Rival

    PORTLAND, Ore. — For the second time, the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals overturned the dismissal of an antivirus software company’s Lanham Act claim against a competitor, finding the defendant’s labels of “malicious” and “threats” for the plaintiff’s products to be statements of objective fact that could potentially support a false advertising claim, rather than “non-actionable statements of opinion,” as a trial court held.

  • June 06, 2023

    Judge: Lawyers Must Certify Whether They Used AI, Checked Its Accuracy

    DALLAS — Lawyers must either certify that ChatGPT and other similar generative artificial intelligence played no role in the creation of a filing or that any language drafted by such programs was checked for accuracy against print reporters or traditional legal databases, a federal judge in Texas said.

  • June 05, 2023

    German Entity Defaulted In Trademark, Award Fight With Twitch, Magistrate Says

    SAN JOSE, Calif. — A California federal magistrate judge recommended that a district judge grant a video-game streaming service’s motion for default judgment confirming a more than $1.5 million arbitral award against a German competitor that has not appeared in court and recommended denying a motion for leave to file an amicus curiae brief filed by German parties that claim that they own the rights to the award-debtor’s domain name.

  • June 02, 2023

    Magistrate Quotes ‘2001:  A Space Odyssey’ In Setting AI Court Rules

    CHICAGO — Any party relying on artificial intelligence for a filing must inform the court of the use and the specific tool used for research or writing, a federal magistrate judge in Illinois said in a new standing order.

  • June 02, 2023

    Industry Orgs Back Music Publishers In High Court Direct Copyright Liability Row

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The day after the Motion Picture Association Inc. (MPA) filed an amicus curiae brief supporting a petition for certiorari by a group of music publishers, a coalition of three music industry associations teamed up on another amicus brief, urging the U.S. Supreme Court to clarify whether direct copyright liability rests solely on the individual that “presses the button” to make infringing copies of a copyrighted work or also on the party who directs or authorizes such infringing activity.

  • June 01, 2023

    DOJ:  Lyrics Website’s Copyright Claims Preempted; Certiorari Should Be Denied

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — State law contractual claims brought by a song lyrics website operator against Google LLC are indistinguishable from federal copyright infringement claims and are, therefore, precluded by Section 301(a) of the Copyright Act, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) argues in an amicus curiae brief in which it recommends that the U.S. Supreme Court deny the company’s petition for certiorari in which it seeks clarification on application of the statute.

  • May 31, 2023

    Vietnamese App Maker Denied Certiorari For Website Jurisdiction Issue

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — A Vietnamese music app creator will have to face copyright infringement claims brought against it by a music distributor because the U.S. Supreme Court denied the company’s petition for certiorari in its May 30 order list, declining to weigh in on a question of when a website can confer jurisdiction over a foreign party.

  • May 30, 2023

    Judge Threatens Sanctions After ChatGPT-Produced Brief Cites Fake Cases

    NEW YORK — An attorney and his law firm must appear at a June hearing to show why they should not be sanctioned for submitting an opposition brief with fake cites created through the use of artificial intelligence software ChatGPT, a federal judge in New York said May 26.

  • May 30, 2023

    Judge Denies Certified Question, Says Parties Must Unwind AI Merger Software Sale

    COLUMBUS, Ohio — A company may rescind the sale of artificial intelligence software that analyzes mergers, acquisitions and other investments after prevailing on a fraudulent inducement claim, a federal judge in Ohio said after declining to certify a question to the Ohio Supreme Court.

  • May 30, 2023

    High Court Declines CDA Immunity Question In Reddit Sex-Trafficking Suit

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — Less than two weeks after the U.S. Supreme Court denied certiorari in a lawsuit over immunity under the Communications Decency Act (CDA) for online platforms in the context of terror-aiding claims, the high court in its May 30 order list denied certiorari in another CDA immunity suit, this one pertaining to sex-trafficking claims against Reddit Inc. centering on over the child sexual exploitation material (CSEM) posted on its platform by third parties.

  • May 30, 2023

    Court Grants Final Approval To $50M Settlement In MacBook Keyboards Class Action

    SAN JOSE, Calif. — A California federal judge granted final approval to a $50 million settlement to resolve claims that Apple Inc. violated California’s unfair competition law (UCL) and consumer protection laws in several other states by selling MacBooks with allegedly defective keyboards, without Apple being required to admit liability.

  • May 26, 2023

    Panel Affirms Denial Of Ring’s Bid To Arbitrate Customers’ UCL Claims

    SAN FRANCISCO — A California appellate court panel on May 25 affirmed a ruling denying Ring LLC’s motion to compel arbitration of a putative class complaint against it for alleged failure to make certain disclosures about the cost of its security camera products, writing that California precedent bars arbitration of the putative class claims seeking public injunctive relief due to violation of California’s unfair competition law (UCL) and other statutes.

  • May 18, 2023

    Supreme Court Sidesteps CDA Immunity Question In Terror-Aiding Case

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on May 18 declined to rule on a question about immunity for an interactive computer service (ICS) provider under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act (CDA) in the context of an Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA) lawsuit against Google LLC, stating that its ruling in a companion case, which was issued the same day, led it to similarly find that the plaintiffs in the present case failed to state a claim under the ATA.

  • May 18, 2023

    Panel Denies Musk’s Claim That SEC Acted In Bad Faith, Nixes Bid To Quash Subpoena

    NEW YORK — A panel of the Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals has affirmed a lower court ruling and held that there is no evidence to support Elon Musk’s contention that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission used a consent decree “to conduct bad-faith, harassing investigations of his protected speech,” with regard to something he tweeted about possibly taking his company Tesla private.  As a result, the panel denied Musk’s bid to quash a subpoena and terminate a consent order that had been instituted in response to his tweeting behavior.

  • May 18, 2023

    High Court:  Social Media Firms Did Not Give ISIS Knowing, Substantial Help

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — Reversing a ruling by the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, the U.S. Supreme Court on May 18 ruled that Twitter Inc., Meta Platforms Inc. and Google LLC did not provide any knowing and substantial assistance to the Islamic State Group (ISIS) in the 2017 Reina nightclub attack and, thus, did not aid and abet the terrorists in violation of the Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA), as amended by the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act (JASTA).

  • May 18, 2023

    Cybersecurity Company’s Mandamus Request For New PTAB Panel Rejected

    WASHINGTON, D.C. — A bid by a cybersecurity company for mandamus relief from a decision by the Patent Trial and Appeal Board instituting inter partes review (IPR) of a packet-filtering patent has been turned away by the Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals.