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

Mealey's Cyber Tech & E-Commerce

August 16, 2023
Sweepstakes Participants Waive Response To Coinbase’s 2nd Certiorari Petition

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A group of consumers who took part in a sweepstakes on the website of Coinbase Inc. filed a notice informing the U.S. Supreme Court that they waived their right to respond to a petition for certiorari that the cryptocurrency exchange filed the same day that the high court issued a ruling dismissing the company’s previous petition in a dispute over enforcing an arbitration clause.
August 04, 2023
COMMENTARY: Artificial Intelligence: Top 3 Legal Issues

By Dr. Andreas Lober
July 27, 2023
COMMENTARY: COVID-19, Generative AI And The “Lost Generation” Of Lawyers

By Jennifer M. Driscoll and Linn F. Freedman
August 16, 2023
United States, Meta Waive Responses To Certiorari Petition Over TCPA, Robo-Calls

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A month after a Facebook user petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to “resolve the continuing and substantial confusion . . . over the definition of an autodialer in the” Telephone Consumer Privacy Act (TCPA), both the United States and Meta Platforms Inc. filed waivers indicating that they do not intend to respond to the petition for certiorari.
August 16, 2023
Advertisers Say YouTube Played Ads To ‘The Void’ In Putative Class Suit

SAN FRANCISCO — Two marketers filed a putative class action in California federal court accusing Google LLC, which owns video platform YouTube, of violating California’s unfair competition law (UCL) by taking their payments to run advertisements on videos that were never seen by real-life viewers.
August 15, 2023
DOJ Backs Certiorari In 1st Amendment Suits Over Texas, Florida Social Media Laws

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Filing an amicus curiae brief on Aug. 14 at the request of the U.S. Supreme Court, the U.S. Department of Justice, on behalf of the United States, opined that certiorari should be granted in parallel lawsuits concerning whether content moderation provisions of recently passed social media laws in Texas and Florida violate the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
August 15, 2023
Third-Party Standing Debated In Suit Over Arkansas Ban On Minors’ Social Media Use

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin and a trade association of internet companies filed briefs in Arkansas federal court addressing whether the association has third-party standing to file suit under the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution on behalf of its members to enjoin enactment of a new state law restricting minors’ access to social media platforms.
August 14, 2023
Justice Kagan Won’t Vacate 9th Circuit’s Mandate Stay In Apple, Epic Antitrust Row

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A mandate that established an injunction permitting Epic Games Inc. to inform consumers of alternate methods of making in-app purchases (IAPs) in its games will remain stayed following Justice Elena Kagan’s denial of the gaming firm’s application to vacate the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals’ stay of the mandate pending Apple Inc.’s forthcoming petition for certiorari with the U.S. Supreme Court related to the matter.
August 14, 2023
7th Circuit Vacates, Remands Denial Of Fee Award In Copyright Case

CHICAGO — Findings by a federal judge in Illinois that an award of attorney fees in favor of a software licensee accused of infringement would not advance the purpose of federal copyright law “strays from our law,” the Seventh Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals ruled Aug. 11 in vacating and remanding.
August 11, 2023
U.S. High Court Denies Request To Dismiss As Moot Website Accessibility Appeal

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Supreme Court on Aug. 10 issued an order denying a request by a self-described “tester” of websites’ compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) to dismiss as moot an appeal by a hotel she sued; the high court stated that “[t]he question of mootness will be subject to further consideration at oral argument in addition to the question presented.”
August 11, 2023
More StubHub Ticket Purchasers Sent To Arbitration In Pandemic Cancellation Suit

SAN FRANCISCO — The Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals found that a trial court erred in a class lawsuit accusing StubHub Inc. of changing its refund policies for events canceled or rescheduled due to the coronavirus pandemic when it denied a motion by the second ticket marketer to compel to arbitration five ticket purchasers who used the company’s mobile application after signing into the website because the “sign-in screen is nearly identical to the website checkout screen that the district court found was sufficient to compel the other forty-eight Plaintiffs to arbitration.”
August 11, 2023
Musk Denied Rehearing By 2nd Circuit In SEC Consent Decree Challenge

NEW YORK — The Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in a two-sentence order denied a petition for rehearing or rehearing en banc filed by Elon Musk after the panel affirmed a trial court’s ruling finding that a consent decree between Musk and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission regarding Musk’s communications about his company on social media should not be modified or terminated.
August 10, 2023
Apple Wins Transfer Of Copyright Case To New York Federal Court

SAN FRANCISCO — A romance author’s copyright lawsuit against Apple Inc. in connection with its distribution of an allegedly infringing e-book belongs in New York federal court, a federal judge in California ruled Aug. 9.
August 10, 2023
Election Commission To Consider AI, Deepfake Political Advertising Rule

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Federal Election Commission (FEC) is soliciting comments on, and is set to consider at its Aug. 10 meeting, whether it should amend the rule prohibiting fraudulent misrepresentation in political campaign advertising to include the use of artificial intelligence (AI).
August 09, 2023
Judge’s Order Questions Jurisdiction Over ChatGPT Defamation Case

ATLANTA — A federal judge in Georgia said OpenAI LLC’s notice of removal vaguely states that none of its entities reside in Georgia, which is insufficient to create diversity jurisdiction over a man’s case claiming he was defamed by artificial intelligence ChatGPT when it created a fake complaint naming him as a defendant. In a docket entry, the court issued an order to show why the case should not be remanded.
August 08, 2023
SEC Adopts New Rules On Cybersecurity Management, Reporting

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has announced the adoption of new rules that will require registrants to disclose material cybersecurity incidents and to make annual reports on information regarding cybersecurity risk management, along with their strategy and governance.
August 08, 2023
AI Merger Software Company Wants Damages For Wrongful Injunction

COLUMBUS, Ohio — A company that developed an artificial intelligence platform designed to analyze mergers and other business pairings told a federal judge in Ohio that having prevailed in a case brought against it by a failed business partner and having been improperly damaged by an injunction, it was entitled to the entire amount of the injunction bond the plaintiff filed.
August 07, 2023
In Blow To Realtime, Panel Says Eligibility Analysis On Remand Was Proper

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Nearly three years after directing a federal judge in Delaware to revisit his finding of ineligibility with regard to five Realtime Data LLC patents, a divided Federal Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals has declared the same five patents — plus two new patents —ineligible after all.
August 07, 2023
Data Processing Patent Deemed Indefinite By North Carolina Federal Judge

GREENSBORO, N.C. — A patent owner who demanded that the owner of an e-commerce website pay a $65,000 licensing fee saw its technology declared unpatentable as indefinite on Aug. 4 by a federal judge in North Carolina.
August 04, 2023
ADA Tester Asks High Court To Dismiss Mooted Website Accessibility Suit

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Because of her recent voluntary dismissal of the underlying complaint against a hotel chain for its purported failure to comply with website accessibility requirements under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), a self-described “tester” tells the U.S. Supreme Court that the case merits dismissal without any need to address the hotel chain’s question on standing in such ADA cases on which the high court granted certiorari.
August 03, 2023
Judge Stays UCL Class Suit Against Cryptocurrency Exchange Pending Arbitration

SAN FRANCISCO — A California federal judge on Aug. 2 granted cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase Inc.’s motion to stay and compel arbitration of putative class claims accusing it of violating California’s unfair competition law (UCL) and other statutes by misrepresenting its platform’s ability to protect funds stored by users in their accounts, finding that the plaintiffs all agreed to arbitrate disputes when they created Coinbase accounts.
August 02, 2023
Orders Related To Proposed Settlement Vacated In Grubhub Faulty Info Class Suit

DENVER — A federal magistrate judge in Colorado issued a minute order vacating orders related to an amended proposed settlement agreement in a class lawsuit by restaurants accusing Grubhub Inc. of deceiving consumers by offering faulty information regarding restaurants that did not partner with it after the parties filed a notice of termination of settlement.
August 01, 2023
Emergency TRO Entered In Trademark, Copyright Row Between Shein, Temu

CHICAGO — A federal judge in Illinois said July 31 that Roadget Business Pte. Ltd., operator of the low-cost fashion and home goods website Shein.com, is likely to succeed on its contributory and vicarious trademark infringement and copyright infringement claims against the operators of the competing website Temu.com.
August 01, 2023
Hotel Chain To High Court: Deny Voluntary Dismissal Of Pending ADA Website Suit

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A hotel chain operator asks the U.S. Supreme Court to reject a respondent’s attempt to voluntarily dismiss an Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) suit over website accommodation, arguing that the self-described “tester” is pursuing dismissal of the suit, which was granted certiorari, only because her string of similar ADA lawsuits “was recently revealed to have been an unethical extortionate scheme.”
August 01, 2023
Justice Kagan Wants Apple’s Reply To Epic’s Bid To Nix Stay In App Store UCL Row

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Six days after Epic Games Inc. filed an emergency application with the U.S. Supreme Court seeking relief from the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals’ stay of a mandate that granted Epic an injunction related to its antitrust claim against Apple Inc. under California’s unfair competition law (UCL), Justice Elena Kagan on July 31 requested a response to the application from Apple in the suit over Apple’s purported anti-competitive behavior related to in-app purchases (IAPs) and its App Store.