Internet Law

Nasty Attitude to Co-Worker, Naughty Word in Web Comment Cost 2 Their Jobs

A hearing officer had discretion to terminate an 11-year government civil service employee over her obnoxious treatment of a co-worker, a New York appeals court has ruled. The fired woman, Penny Sindoni, was an organizer of the “I Hate Teena” club directed at a disliked fellow Tioga County Health Department…

Nov 20, 2009 12:54 AM CST

PI Firm Sues Competitor for Hijacking Name in Online Searches

Wisconsin’s largest personal injury law firm has taken a different legal tack in an effort to get a competitor to stop hijacking its name in Google searches. Habush, Habush & Rottier has sued competitor Cannon & Dunphy for paying Google and other search engines to direct people who search for…

Nov 19, 2009 3:56 PM CST

More Hackers Target Law Firms, Often ‘Spear Fishing’ in Spam E-Mail

Computer hackers are targeting law firms as a potential motherlode of confidential information, often relying on “spear fishing” attacks in which personalized spam e-mail appears to come from a trusted individual. While the e-mail itself doesn’t pose a danger, clicking on a link within the e-mail can invite malicious software…

Nov 17, 2009 12:18 AM CST

Judge Nixes ‘Hackintosher’ Bid to Put Mac OS X in Cloned Computers

Apple won a legal battle over the use of its operating system Friday, when a federal judge in San Francisco ruled that Psystar violated copyright law by selling its own cloned computers with Mac OS X. The clone-maker got around Apple’s restrictions on using the operating system in non-Macintosh machines…

Nov 16, 2009 7:28 PM CST

Universal Settles Newspapers’ Complaints Over Fake Alien Abduction News

A marketing ploy by Universal Pictures has backfired, with the studio agreeing to pay $22,500 for creating fake news reports about alien abductions attributed to seven real media organizations in Alaska. Universal created the online articles to promote its alien-abduction movie, The Fourth Kind, according to the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner…

Nov 13, 2009 2:23 PM CST

Convicted Germans Seek to Edit History in Suit Against Wikipedia

Two Germans convicted of killing an actor in 1990 are suing Wikipedia’s parent in an effort to force the online, publicly edited encyclopedia to remove their names from an English-language entry about their crime. The plaintiffs, Wolfgang Werlé and Manfred Lauber, say their right to privacy should prevail, the New…

Nov 13, 2009 1:58 PM CST

Lawyer Subpoenas Newspaper for Identity of Online Critic

A Kentucky lawyer wants to know the identity of an online critic who went by the screen name “supercalifragilistic.” The lawyer, Astrida Lemkins of Lexington, Ky., claims supercalifragilistic defamed her in online comments on Kentucky.com, a website operated by the Lexington Herald-Leader, according to stories on Kentucky.com and WKYT.com. She…

Nov 12, 2009 1:36 PM CST

Warning: Eric Holder Doesn’t Really Want You to Pay $370

The FBI has issued a warning about a new e-mail scam that uses the name of Attorney General Eric Holder in an effort to collect $370. The e-mail tells the recipients that they are being investigated for terrorism and money laundering crimes, but they can pay $370 to buy a…

Nov 11, 2009 12:51 PM CST

Law Firm & Ex-Associate Litigate Badmouth Blog Battle in State & Federal Court

A war of words between Levinson Axelrod and ex-associate Edward Harrington Heyburn is now in litigation. The New Jersey-based personal injury law firm filed an order to show cause in state court in Middlesex County Superior Court last week, seeking a shutdown order concerning the website in which Heyburn criticizes…

Nov 10, 2009 8:54 PM CST

Viruses Can Infect Computers with Child Porn, Leading to Legal Charges

Viruses can infect your computer, allowing pedophiles to view child porn when your PC is online or to use your computer to surf child porn sites. An infected computer may be the least of your problems, the Associated Press reports. “An Associated Press investigation found cases in which innocent people…

Nov 10, 2009 7:01 PM CST

Glenn Beck Loses Trademark Claim Over Domain Name

Glenn Beck has lost a trademark claim over a domain name that is part of a parody of his interviewing style. An arbitrator with the World Intellectual Property Organization rejected Beck’s claim against glennbeckrapedandmurderedayounggirlin1990.com, Online Media Daily reports. The arbitrator said the site’s creator, Isaac Eiland-Hall, was making a political…

Nov 10, 2009 3:50 PM CST

Judge Rules Web Commenter Will Be Unmasked to Mom of Criticized Teen

An Illinois judge has decided that an anonymous commenter on a newspaper website will be unmasked, even though the mother of a teen about whom “Hipcheck16” allegedly made “deeply disturbing” comments hasn’t yet decided whether to sue over the posting. The mother, Lisa Stone, is a trustee of Buffalo Grove…

Nov 9, 2009 10:00 PM CST

Shill Bids for Domain Names Made by Auction Company Exec, Suit Alleges

Shill bids for tens of thousands of domain names were secretly made by a former executive of the company that auctioned the domain names, a lawsuit alleges. An unidentified former vice-president of SnapNames.com, which is a subsidiary of Oversee.Net, Inc., manipulated the auction and drove up prices for domain name…

Nov 9, 2009 5:57 PM CST

Ex-Associate Badmouths Former Firm in Legal Blog

It isn’t what an attorney would generally recommend to a client. But attorney Edward Harrington Heyburn says he was willing to risk litigation when he created a legal blog that badmouths partners at the New Jersey law firm at which he formerly worked, Levinson Axelrod. His Levinson Axelrod Sucks blog…

Nov 2, 2009 7:35 PM CST

Fed’l Judge Rules From Bench for ABA: ‘Red Flags’ Doesn’t Apply to Lawyers

Updated: In a surprise ruling from the bench today, a federal judge in Washington, D.C., agreed with the American Bar Association that the Federal Trade Commission exceeded its authority by applying its “red flags rule” to practicing lawyers. Congress did not intend lawyers to be considered “creditors” under the Fair…

Oct 30, 2009 12:33 AM CDT