Internet Law

Blogger Beware: You Can Be Sued Over ‘Anonymous’ Posts

Updated: When you’re angry, complaining on the Web about a business or the person who runs it can be tempting. But you might want to think a bit before putting up an online rant. While website hosts are generally protected from liability for comments posted by others, those who write…

Aug 24, 2010 1:25 PM CDT

California Town Abandons Facebook Page Amid Legal Concerns

The city of Redondo Beach, Calif., is abandoning its Facebook page after hearing about potential legal problems. The city council voted to ditch the page last week after City Attorney Mike Webb outlined his concerns about the First Amendment and state legal requirements, the Daily Breeze reports. The legal issues…

Aug 24, 2010 10:30 AM CDT

Rare Arrest of Alleged Russian ID Thief Results from Trip to France

Even though the alleged identity of a high-profile Russian hacker—Vladislav Horohorin—has been known since 2009, it wasn’t until he took a trip to France earlier this month that “BadB” was arrested. Now a French court must decide whether to extradite him to the United States, where he could be jailed…

Aug 23, 2010 11:56 PM CDT

Judge OKs Suit re Maker’s Claimed Failure to Warn of ‘Addictive’ Nature of Lineage II Web Game

A federal judge in Hawaii has given a green light to part of a pro se plaintiff’s lawsuit contending that he wasted some 20,000 hours playing Lineage II between 2004 and 2009, due to the maker’s failure to warn him in advance of the addictive nature of the Internet game.…

Aug 20, 2010 7:15 PM CDT

Canadian Lawyer Told to Hand Over Computer Used to Create False Online Personas

A crusading Canadian human rightslawyer has been ordered to turn over a laptop computer he used to create false personas on far-right websites to search for evidence that he may have secretly authored a racist comment against a black Canadian senator from Toronto. The ruling came in a libel suit…

Aug 20, 2010 6:09 PM CDT

No Criminal Charges in Case Over School District’s Alleged Webcam Spying on Students

Saying that they could not prove requisite intent, federal authorities today announced they do not intend to pursue criminal charges against those responsible for admittedly taking photos of some students within their homes and elsewhere on webcams embedded in laptop computers issues by a Pennsylvania school district. However, civil litigation…

Aug 17, 2010 11:26 PM CDT

Morgue Photos Prompt Court-Ordered Ban, Civil Suit

Prompted by a morgue photo, a Venezuelan court has banned newspapers in the South American country from publishing violent images. But an editor for the El Nacional newspaper that published the photo said the ban was political and suggested that the publication might violate it, reports the Associated Press. The…

Aug 17, 2010 10:48 PM CDT

Threat to Post Ex-Lover’s Nude Photos Online Not Harassment, NJ Court Rules

A threat to post an ex-lover’s nude photos online may not be cool. But it doesn’t rise to the level of harassment under New Jersey’s domestic violence law, a state appeals court has held. Monday’s ruling (PDF), the New Jersey Law Journal reported, reversed a trial court judge’s issuance of…

Aug 13, 2010 6:11 PM CDT

FCC’s Closed-Door Confab with Industry Reps re Net Neutrality Rules Worries Observers

Left-out consumer advocates are complaining that the Federal Communications Commission has been conducting closed-door meetings since June with industry giants about proposed net neutrality rules. Following word that the FCC had a rare Saturday sitdown last weekend with AT&T Inc., Google Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc., Josh Silver worries that…

Aug 3, 2010 9:33 PM CDT

Beyond Big Brother: Some Web Hosts Are Watching Your Every Keystroke

There’s a cost to that free content you probably enjoy on the Internet—a loss of privacy. Web hosts are watching what you read, what you say, what you buy and where you go online, via cookies and other tracking tools that enable them to assemble—and sell—detailed profiles to other companies,…

Aug 2, 2010 11:02 PM CDT

Hackers Find a Way to Steal Some $9M from Writers of Paper Checks

For those who think using old-fashioned checks is the way to avoid Internet scamsters, an enterprising group of criminals has found a high-tech way to steal from them, too. An unknown band of thieves believed to be based in Russia hacked into several websites for businesses that store check images…

Aug 2, 2010 5:36 PM CDT

Floyd Abrams on WikiLeaks: Secrecy, Even if Needed, Is a Dying Concept

Once upon a time when the Pentagon Papers were leaked to the New York Times by Daniel Ellsberg, both he and the newspaper made decisions to withhold some of the material, based on concerns about national security. Nonetheless, there was a huge uproar over the leak. But those days are…

Jul 27, 2010 2:41 AM CDT

Despite ‘Utter Lack of Taste & Propriety,’ FB Posts Didn’t Libel & Parents Had No Duty to Monitor

In an apparent effort to extend the frontiers of defamation law where cyberbullying is concerned, a New York law firm sued four former classmates of an Oceanside High School student and their parents seeking $6 million in compensatory and punitive damages for an alleged vicious Facebook onslaught under the guise…

Jul 26, 2010 8:55 PM CDT

Law Firm & Angry Ex-Associate Settle Suit Over Badmouth Blog

Whether you saw it as the “horrendous cyber-assault” claimed by Levinson Axelrod or simply an ex-associate’s legitimate expression of opinion, however unflattering, about the New Jersey law firm that formerly employed him, a badmouth blog that captured public attention with its angry audacity is no more. A confidential settlement last…

Jul 26, 2010 5:53 PM CDT

Kids Need to Learn Internet Credibility, Law Prof Says

Internet rumors can be more explosive and more hurtful than the kind passed along in conversation, but education rather than legislation is the solution, a law professor says. Harvard law professor John Palfrey says kids need to be taught to sort out information they see online and to decide what’s…

Jul 23, 2010 11:00 AM CDT