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Court decision poses serious privacy threat: A little Fourth Amendment law: Warrants are required when law enforcement wants to violate citizens' reasonable expectations of privacy. The Supreme Court has held, for instance, that you have no reasonable expectation of privacy when driving a car, since you are putting yourself in public view and using public streets,...; Tags: Privacy, Courts; Blog posts 2007-07-18
RIAA hit with $68,000 in attorney's fees: In November 2004, the Recording Industry Association of America sued Deborah Foster for copyright infringement, claiming her IP address was connected to illegal downloading. It expanded the suit to include her adult daughter Amanda and won a default judgement against Amanda. But the RIAA kept going after Debbie, trying to...; Tags: Courts; Blog posts 2007-07-17
Sue-happy RIAA gets hit with malicious prosecution claim: In their crusade against illegal file sharing, it looks like the Recording Industry Association of America has taken their job a bit too seriously. Ars Technica reports that one exonerated defendant may bring suit against the RIAA for malicious prosecution, and there may be more.Tanya Andersen, a disabled single mother...; Tags: Courts; Blog posts 2007-06-26
'Day of Silence' for Internet radio: Gandhi would be proud of what probably is the Internet's first passive resistance protest--the "Day of Silence" coming to Internet radio on June 26. As a response to a court ruling that imposes huge increases on the royalty rates Internet radio operators must pay - which are applied retroactively, no...; Tags: Courts, Congress; Blog posts 2007-06-22
EFF filing brief in TorrentSpy case: The Electronic Frontier Foundation has plans to file an amicus brieffor TorrentSpy as it defends itself against copyright violation charges filed by the Motion Picture Association of America, reports CNET News.comThe case is notable because TorrentSpy had attempted to guard against lawsuits by simply not logging any user information. But...; Tags: Privacy, Courts; Blog posts 2007-06-21

Best Buy lawyer falsified emails in class action suit: When it rains it pours buckets of legal problem for Best Buy, who had another predicament sprung on them the other day. One of the lawyers who is defending the company against a class-action lawsuit has confessed to "faking two e-mails and a memo" related to the suit, reports Ars...; Tags: Courts; Blog posts 2007-06-13
DOJ backs off of Microsoft as former counsel dismisses Google's antitrust claim: The Bush administration seems to be softening its stance on Microsoft and the company's anticompetitive conduct, reports the New York TimesThis change in attitude mirrors the market shift from desktop software to Internet search and web-based software, which circumvents Microsoft. The recent rejection of an antitrust complaint filed by Google...; Tags: State &, Local Govt, Courts; Blog posts 2007-06-11
Teacher in porn popup case likely to be exonerated: The substitute teacher who was convicted on four felony counts of risking injury to minors after she failed to prevent porn ads from popping up on a classroom computer has been granted a motion for a new trial, reports Wired News. Julie Amero, of Norwich, Conn., who was to be...; Tags: Courts; Blog posts 2007-06-07
Internet ban for life overturned by appeals court: Just how far can a court go in punishing child sex offenders? A US District Court in Pennsylvania had dealt with Daniel Voelke - a 35-year-old Pennsylvania resident who was charged with possessing child and sexual exploitation of a minor after briefly exposing the naked rear end of...; Tags: Courts; Blog posts 2007-06-06
Virtual land beef moves to realworld court: A lawsuit over virtual property is being played out in a very real courtroom as a Pennsylvania judge has denied two motions by Linden Labs, creators of Second Life, to allow them to shut down an attorney's account, reports Ars Technica.Pennsylvania attorney Marc Bragg says his Second Life property is...; Tags: Courts; Blog posts 2007-06-06
NPR file suit in net radio royalty conflict: National Public Radio has joined the ranks of online radio broadcasters objecting to recent ruling to increase music royalty fees, reports the Associated Press.NPR filed a notice with the DC Circuit Court of Appeals this week, stating that it would challenge the ruling by a panel of copyright judges that...; Tags: Courts, Congress; Blog posts 2007-06-01
Whosarat.com reveals informants' IDs - and prosecutors want it shut down: Hey, all you convicted felons out there! Want to find out who snitched on you? Check out whosarat.com, the website that exposes the identities of witnesses and informants cooperating with the government. But you better hurry, federal prosecutors are getting wind of the site and they are mad.Prosecutors are trying...; Tags: Courts, Law enforcement; Blog posts 2007-05-24
Huge anti-spam suit targets email harvesters: Unspam Technologies, a company that consults with government agencies and private companies, and with users in 100 countries, filed suit today seeking the identity of those who have harvested millions of emails on behalf of spammers, The Washington Post reports. Attorney Jon Praed of the Internet Law Group said...; Tags: Courts, Government technology; Blog posts 2007-04-26
Who owns public employees' emails when they're about 'private' subjects?: Are email messages between public employees using public computers considered private property? Would that protect the emails from a states open-records law? Thats the question the Idaho Supreme Court is being asked to decide, reports the Associated Press. The dispute is betweeen the The Spokesman-Review newspaper on one...; Tags: Open government, Government technology, Courts; Blog posts 2007-04-04
NJ court: Citizens may videotape government meetings: The New Jersey Supreme Court issued a wake-up all to state and local governments this week: Wake up - its the YouTube era. Robert Wayne Tarus was arrested after he tried to videotape two Pine Hill Borough Council meetings in 2000. Yesterday the state Supreme Court ruled that...; Tags: Open government, Censorship, Courts, Government technology, State &, Local Govt; Blog posts 2007-03-08
VT votes to allow convicts to request DNA: The Vermont Senate will consider allowing prisoners to request testing of DNA evidence, the Rutland Herald reports. In a unanimous preliminary vote, the Senate Judiciary Committee approved the bill, based in part on the work of the Innocence Project, based in New York City, on Wednesday. The committee is...; Tags: Government technology, State &, Local Govt, Courts; Blog posts 2007-02-22
Maine's attempt to force Verizon disclosure moves to CA: The Maine PUCs attempts to learn whether Verizon provided customer data to the National Security Agency took another turn this week. The case has been assigned to a federal court in California, The Portland Press Herald reports. Last May consumers tried to learn whether the NSA had been provided...; Tags: Government technology, State &, Local Govt, Courts, Privacy; Blog posts 2007-02-20
FTC asks court to stop pretexting: Action Research Group, one of the investigative companies hired by HP, and Eye in the Sky Investigations, which subcontracted to Action, have been singled out by the FTC, which has requested a federal court to order the companies to stop "pretexting," InfoWorld reports. In a complaint filed Wednesday...; Tags: Government technology, Courts; Blog posts 2007-02-15
IN tests GPS tech for 24/7 monitoring: Indiana officials are testing out a new GPS system in Allen County to monitor sex offenders and violent offenders on parole, The Indianapolis Star reports. The Allen County trial is a prelude to statewide use of the devices for all sexual and violent parolees. Last year, lawmakers...; Tags: Courts, Government technology, State &, Local Govt; Blog posts 2007-02-13
Court OKs warrantless tracking with GPS: The 7th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled last week that police can place a GPS tracking unit on a suspects car without obtaining a search warrant. In US v Garcia (2007 U.S. App. LEXIS 2272), decided Feb. 2, Judge Richard Posner found that such a device was a mere "augmentation"...; Tags: Government technology, Courts, Law enforcement, GPS; Blog posts 2007-02-08