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

Mealey's Cyber Tech & E-Commerce

July 19, 2023
9th Circuit: No Secondary Copyright Infringement For Embedded Instagram Photos

SAN FRANCISCO — Because pictures from Instagram’s platform are not saved on the servers of third-party websites that embed the pictures in posts, a Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel found that the social network operator cannot be found liable for secondary infringement of any embedded copyrighted photos.
July 19, 2023
Amicus Backs New Coinbase Petition Over Arbitration Agreement Delegation Clauses

WASHINGTON, D.C. — On the heels of a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in favor of Coinbase Inc. on a question over litigation stays and arbitrability disputes, a law professor filed an amicus curiae brief supporting the cryptocurrency exchange’s newly filed petition for certiorari on the enforcement and application of delegation clauses in determining who is tasked with resolving an arbitrability dispute.
June 27, 2023
COMMENTARY: Time For Lawyers To Become “Prompt Scientists”? – How AI Is Being Immersed Into The Legal Practice

By Roy Hadley
July 17, 2023
Facebook User To High Court: Resolve TCPA Ambiguity Over Random Number Generators

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Despite a 2021 ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court on what types of automated calls and messages violate the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA), a man who filed a putative class action over unwanted texts he received in connection with his Facebook account tells the high court in a petition for certiorari that confusion still reigns in the lower courts over what functions a random or sequential number generator (RSNG) must perform to run afoul of the statute’s prohibition against robocalls.
July 17, 2023
TikTok Users Seek Preliminary Injunction Of Montana Law Banning The Social Network

MISSOULA, Mont. — A group of TikTok users who sued Montana’s attorney general to prevent enforcement of a new law banning use of the social network in the state filed a preliminary injunction motion in Montana federal court, representing that they will face irreparable harm if the statute is permitted to take effect on Jan. 1.
July 17, 2023
9th Circuit Asked To Approve Dismissal Of $310M Apple Device-Slowing Suit Appeal

SAN FRANCISCO — Two objectors to the settlement of a consolidated class action over Apple Inc.’s purported performance-throttling of certain mobile devices filed a letter in the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, seeking approval of a joint stipulation to dismiss their appeal over attorney fee and incentive awards related to the $310 million settlement.
July 14, 2023
Online Firms Brief 9th Circuit On Jack Daniel’s Relevance In ‘Punchbowl’ Mark Row

PASADENA, Calif. — In post-decision, supplemental briefs, two internet-based companies debate in the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals whether the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent ruling in Jack Daniel’s Properties Inc. v. VIP Products LLC mandates that their dispute over their uses of the “Punchbowl” trademark merits remand for a trial court to determine whether the Rogers v. Grimaldi test should be applied.
July 14, 2023
Music Publishers Call 2nd Circuit’s Direct Liability Standard ‘Impossibly Narrow’

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals’ holding that direct copyright liability can be found only against “the person who actually presses the button” to make infringing copies runs counter to the Copyright Act and U.S. Supreme Court precedent, a group of music publishers tells the high court in a reply brief supporting their petition for certiorari.
July 13, 2023
Google Accused Of Stealing Data From Gmail Accounts To Train AI Chatbot

SAN FRANCISCO — Eight anonymous plaintiffs filed a putative class action accusing Alphabet Inc., Google LLC and their AI subsidiary of violating California’s unfair competition law (UCL), copyright law and privacy laws by “stealing everything ever created and shared on the internet by hundreds of millions of Americans,” including the plaintiffs’ private data contained in their private Google email accounts, to train their AI chatbot.
July 12, 2023
‘WallStreetBets’ Creator’s UCL Suit Dismissed Due To Lack Of Trademark Rights

SAN FRANCISCO — A California federal judge on July 11 granted online forum host Reddit Inc.’s motion to dismiss a lawsuit filed against it by an investor and entrepreneur who claims that it violated California’s unfair competition law (UCL) and his trademark in part by banning him from the “WallStreetBets” forum on its platform, which he created, finding that he did not establish trademark rights and that Reddit was immune from his other claims as an online publisher.
July 11, 2023
4th Circuit Finds University Did Not Retaliate Over Professor’s Blog Post

RICHMOND, Va. — Concluding that a professor’s controversial blog post did not constitute protected speech under the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution against North Carolina State University (NCSU), a Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel majority affirmed a trial court’s dismissal of his claims that the university retaliated against him for the post.
July 11, 2023
Content Companies Say Artists Misunderstand How AI Apps Work

SAN FRANCISCO — Three companies engaged in artificial intelligence content generation told a federal judge in California that artists accusing them of stealing original works misstate copyright law and misunderstand how the programs in question work.
July 10, 2023
Summary Judgment Sought By SEC, Digital Asset Firm In Suit Over Failure To Register

NEW YORK — Both sides moved for summary judgment in a lawsuit in a federal court in New York in which the Securities and Exchange Commission accuses a digital asset firm of offering or selling billions of units of its digital token as securities without registering them as such.
July 10, 2023
Tech Trade Group Says Arkansas Minors Protection Act Violates 1st Amendment

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — A newly passed Arkansas law that requires social media platforms to verify the ages of minor users is a governmental attempt “to restrict new forms of expression based on concerns that they harm minors,” NetChoice LLC tells an Arkansas federal court in a complaint alleging that enforcement of the law would result in constitutional violations.
July 10, 2023
Sarah Silverman, Writers Sue AI Companies For Using Copyrighted Works

SAN FRANCISCO — The actress and comedian Sarah Silverman and two writers on July 7 filed a putative class action claiming that they are the owners of copyrighted works that were acquired by OpenAI Inc. and affiliated companies and used as part of the datasets with which they trained the ChatGPT AI chatbot, in violation of copyright infringement laws and California’s unfair competition law (UCL).
July 06, 2023
DOJ To High Court: Blocking From Personal Social Media Pages Is Not State Action

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Filing an amicus curiae brief on behalf of the federal government, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) tells the U.S. Supreme Court that school board members’ blocking of individuals from their personal social media pages did not constitute a state action subject to scrutiny under the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution because their power to block flowed from account features offered on the platforms, not from the exercise of “any powers of their offices.”
July 06, 2023
9th Circuit: Online Sale, Shipment Of Infringing Product Confers Jurisdiction

SAN FRANCISCO — An Arizona federal judge erred in finding a lack of personal jurisdiction over defendants accused of trademark infringement, the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals ruled July 5, because the defendants’ sale and subsequent shipment of allegedly infringing, physical products to Arizona caused an Arizona-based plaintiff harm.
July 06, 2023
$3.5M Class Settlement Approved In Crypto Securities Case

NEW HAVEN, Conn. — A federal judge in Connecticut granted final approval of a $3.5 million settlement reached between a class of investors and the control person for two cryptocurrency companies in a case stemming from the alleged operation of a Ponzi scheme-like fraud that was slated for a new trial after a jury trial resulted in a complete defense verdict.
July 06, 2023
‘WallStreetBets’ Creator’s UCL Suit May Proceed While TTAB Case Paused, Judge Says

SAN FRANCISCO — A California federal judge denied online forum host Reddit Inc.’s motion to stay a lawsuit filed by an investor and entrepreneur accusing it of violating California’s unfair competition law (UCL) and violating his trademark in part by banning him from the “WallStreetBets” forum on its platform, citing a suspension of a related proceeding ordered by the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board (TTAB).
July 06, 2023
Worker Files Class Petition To Compel Twitter To Pay Arbitration Fees

SAN FRANCISCO — A former Twitter Inc. employee filed a class petition in a federal court in California to compel Twitter and X Corp. to pay all arbitration fees for thousands of pending individual arbitrations pursuant to the rules of Judicial Arbitration and Mediation Services (JAMS).
July 06, 2023
Class Suit Filed After Apple Fails To Include Charging Block With IPhone 14 Pro

SYRACUSE, N.Y. — Apple Inc.’s sales of the iPhone 14 Pro without a charging block prevented purchasers from being able to use the phones as intended as a component that is necessary to charge the battery is missing, a New York woman alleges in a class complaint filed in a federal court in New York.
July 05, 2023
Judge Won’t Dismiss UCL Suit Against Company That Posted Woman’s Yearbook Photo

SAN FRANCISCO — A California federal judge denied a motion by an aggregator of yearbook photographs to dismiss a putative class action against it for violating California right of publicity and unfair competition laws, finding that the lone remaining plaintiff plausibly alleged that the aggregator incorporated her image into its “advertising flow” directing website visitors to make a purchase.
July 05, 2023
OpenAI Contests California Competition, Copyright Claims

OAKLAND, Calif. — Plaintiffs claiming that artificial intelligence programs produce licensed materials posted to GitHub without attribution have not shown the programs produced the code for anyone but themselves or that copyright law would not preempt their case and have not adequately pleaded their claims under the California unfair competition law (UCL), OpenAI tells a federal judge in California in a motion to dismiss an amended complaint.
June 30, 2023
Supreme Court Rules Web Designer Not Required To Serve Same-Sex Couples

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Reversing a ruling by the 10th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, a U.S. Supreme Court majority on June 30 found that Colorado cannot require a website designer to create pages for same-sex couples under a state anti-discrimination act, holding that doing so would violate the principles of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and would run counter to the nation’s long-standing goal of tolerance.
June 30, 2023
Authors Say AI Chatbot Companies Use Copyrighted Work Without Credit

SAN FRANCISCO — Two authors filed a putative class action accusing the companies that created ChatGPT and other AI chatbots of copyright infringement, unjust enrichment and violating California’s unfair competition law (UCL) by using their copyrighted works of fiction in the training datasets for their software without permission or compensation.