Justia Internet Law Opinion Summaries

This matter was before the court on plaintiff's motion to disregard the testimony of defendant on certain subjects. When called as an adverse witness during plaintiff's case-in-chief, defendant invoked his constitutional rights against self-incrimination under the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and Article 1, Section 7 of the Delaware Constitution and refused to answer various questions concerning, among other things, allegations that he downloaded confidential data to USB devices in the final weeks of his employment with plaintiff and retained those devices and data after his employment ended. The court concluded that defendant's testimony on cross-examination did extend into certain subjects he refused to address on direct, albeit not as broadly as plaintiff contended. Therefore, the court held that defendant's invocation of his privilege against self-incrimination required that the court disregard his testimony as to those subjects and, to that limited extent, granted plaintiff's motion.View "W.L. Gore & Assoc., Inc. v. Darrell Long and BHA Group, Inc. (d/b/a GE Energy)" on Justia Law

Over seven days in 2009, Ocean Bank authorized six apparently fraudulent withdrawals, totaling $588,851.26, from an account held by Patco, after the perpetrators correctly supplied Patco's customized answers to security questions. Although the bank's security system flagged each transaction as unusually "high-risk" because they were inconsistent with the timing, value, and geographic location of Patco's regular orders, the system did not notify commercial customers of such information and allowed the payments to go through. Ocean Bank was able to block or recover $243,406.83. Patco sued, alleging that the bank should bear the loss because its security system was not commercially reasonable under Article 4A of the Uniform Commercial Code (Me. Rev. Stat. tit. 11, 4-1101) and that Patco had not consented to the procedures. The district court held that the bank's security system was commercially reasonable and entered judgment in favor of the bank. The First Circuit reversed the grant of summary judgment on commercial reasonableness and remanded for determination of what, if any, obligations or responsibilities Article 4A imposes on Patco. View "Patco Constr. Co., Inc. v. People's United Bank" on Justia Law

Defendant was convicted of three counts of wire fraud, 18 U.S.C. 1343 and 2 and was sentenced to 151 months, for participation in an advance-fee scheme, in which the victim is persuaded to pay a sum of money up front in order to receive a larger sum of money at a later. The district court concluded, based in part on email exchanges, that he was a manager or supervisor of at least one other participant in the scheme, and that the overall criminal activity involved five or more participants. The Second Circuit affirmed. Courts may rely on unique email addresses in assessing a defendant’s role in a scheme and calculating the number of participants for sentencing purposes. View "United States v. Diamreyan" on Justia Law

UMG filed suit against Veoh for direct and secondary copyright infringement where users of Veoh's service have in the past been able, without UMG's authorization, to download videos containing songs for which UMG owned a copyright. The district court granted summary judgment to Veoh after determining that it was protected by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), 17 U.S.C. 512(c), "safe harbor" limiting service providers' liability for "infringement of copyright by reason of the storage at the direction of a user of material that resides on a system or network controlled or operated by or for the service provider." The court affirmed the district court's determination on summary judgment that Veoh was entitled to section 512(c) safe harbor protection where Veoh met all the section 512(c) requirements. The district court also affirmed the district court's dismissal of the claims of secondary liability against the Investor Defendants. The court further affirmed the district court's determination that, in this case, attorney's fees could not be awarded under Rule 68. The court remanded for the district court to consider in the first instance whether Veoh was entitled to Rule 68 costs excluding attorney's fees.View "UMG Recordings, Inc., et al. v. Shelter Capital Partners LLC, et al." on Justia Law

Defendants, who operated what purported to be online pharmacies, were convicted on a 42-count indictment alleging crimes arising from a multi-national, internet-based, controlled-substance-distribution scheme. They have appealed multiple decisions of the trial court and appealed their conviction. The Third Circuit affirmed. Among other challenges, the court rejected arguments: that the money-laundering convictions impermissibly merge with underlying predicate felonies; that the district court should have suppressed evidence from untimely-sealed surveillance records; that the indictment, evidence, and jury instructions were insufficient to sustain a Continuing Criminal Enterprise conviction; and that the court erred in calculating sentences; the the alleged conduct, distribution of controlled substances via the internet, was not illegal at the time charged; that the money laundered was obtained by lawful means; and that certain convictions were misdemeanors, not felonies. View "United States v. Mullinix" on Justia Law

Plaintiff and defendant, both women, met in 2005 through a chatroom connected with a television series. Defendant, in Illinois, used her own name and aliases to communicate with plaintiff, in Los Angeles. One alias was that of a man, and a romantic relationship developed through the Internet, telephone, and mail. Defendant disguised her female identity using a voice-altering device. Plaintiff purchased airline tickets for a meeting in Denver, but her new “boyfriend” cancelled the plans. Plaintiff was informed that he had attempted suicide. In 2006 the two planned to live together in Colorado, but defendant subsequently informed plaintiff, using another alias, that the man had died of cancer. The deception continued for seven more months until plaintiff’s real friends confronted defendant and obtained a videotaped admission as to what had occurred. Plaintiff’s third amended complaint, alleging fraudulent misrepresentation and seeking damages for the cost of a therapist, lost earnings, and emotional distress, was dismissed. The appellate court affirmed, holding that claims made in the previous complaint, but not incorporated into the third amended complaint, had been abandoned. The supreme court affirmed, holding that a claim for fraudulent misrepresentation does not apply to a personal relationship with no commercial component. View "Bonhomme v. St. James" on Justia Law

Apple claimed that Samsung smartphones, the Galaxy S and the Infuse, and its Galaxy Tab 10.1 tablet infringed four Apple patents. Apple sought a preliminary injunction to block importation and U.S. sales. The district court denied the motion with respect to each device and all asserted patents. As to one patent, the court found that Apple failed to show likelihood of success on the merits because the patented design did not cover functional features and the design aspect was likely anticipated. As to others, the court held that Apple failed to show that it would likely suffer irreparable harm from continuing infringement while the case was pending, rejecting a claim of erosion of design distinctiveness. The court concluded that the absence of a nexus between the claimed design and the loss of market share, coupled with delay in seeking an injunction, undercut a claim of irreparable harm. With respect to a patent for the tablet computer, the court found that the design was not dictated by functionality and may have been obvious. The Federal Circuit affirmed with respect to three patents. With respect to the fourth, the court vacated, holding that the district court erred in its validity analysis. View "Apple, Inc. v. Samsung Elec. Co., Ltd." on Justia Law

EPIC filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), 5 U.S.C. 552, request with the NSA seeking disclosure of any communications between NSA and Google regarding encryption and cyber security. EPIC's FOIA request arose out of a January 2010 cyber attack on Google that primarily targeted the Gmail accounts of human rights activists. The court held that any response to EPIC's FOIA request might reveal whether NSA did or did not consider a particular cyber security incident, or the security settings in particular commercial technologies, to be a potential threat to U.S. Government information systems. Any such threat assessment, as well as any ensuing action or inaction, implicated an undisputed NSA "function" and thus fell within the broad ambit of Section 6 of the National Security Agency Act, Pub. L. No 86-36, section 6(a), 73 Stat. 63. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "Electronic Privacy Info. Center v. National Security Agency" on Justia Law

Leader, a software company, owns the 761 patent, which discloses a system that manages data that may be accessed and created by multiple users over a network. The patent improves upon conventional systems by associating data "with an individual, group of individuals, and topical content, and not simply with a folder, as in traditional systems." The system achieves this improvement by having users collaborate and communicate through boards that are accessible through an Internet browser and appear as a webpage. To facilitate those user-facing functions, the data management system employs metadata, tagged to data being created, to capture the association between the data and its context. As users create and change their contexts, the data (files) and applications automatically follow. Prior to filing the 761 application in 2003, Leader developed Leader2Leader.® Facebook claimed that the earlier product, publicly used and on sale prior to December 10, 2002 fell within the scope of the asserted claims of the 761 patent, rendering them invalid under 35 U.S.C. 102(b). The district court ruled in favor of Facebook. The Federal Circuit affirmed, finding the verdict supported by substantial evidence. View "Leader Tech., Inc. v. Facebook, Inc." on Justia Law

Defendant, a computer programmer employed by Goldman Sachs & Co., appealed his conviction for stealing and transferring proprietary computer source code of Goldman's high frequency trading system in violation of the National Stolen Property Act (NSPA), 18 U.S.C. 2314, and the Economic Espionage Act of 1996 (EEA), 18 U.S.C. 1832. Defendant argued, inter alia, that his conduct did not constitute an offense under either statute because: (1) the source code was not a "stolen" "good" within the meaning of the NSPA, and (2) the source code was not "related" to a product "produced for or placed in interstate or foreign commerce" within the meaning of the EEA. The court agreed and concluded that defendant's conduct did not constitute an offense under either the NSPA or the EEA, and that the indictment was therefore legally insufficient. Accordingly, the court reversed the judgment of the district court. View "United States v. Aleynikov" on Justia Law