The Samsung Galaxy Nexus phone- called a “genuine iPhone challenger” by some- may suddenly become in short supply here in the United States, given that yesterday Judge Lucy Koh in the Northern District of California granted Apple’s request in a patent litigation (Case No. 12-CV-00630-LHK) for an injunction blocking imports of Samsung’s phone.  The catch?  A  $95,637,141.60 bond requirement- the very amount Samsung suggested.  Doubt that will be a problem for Apple, and still $4,362,858.40 cheaper than Raj Rajaratnam’s bail.

Japanese fans of Game of Thrones (玉座のゲーム), beware! The Japanese parliament is currently considering a revision to its copyright laws that would make illegal downloading of music or movies a crime, with a potential penalty of a fine of the equivalent of $25,000 USD, or up to two years in jail. It’s currently a civil matter, but if these revisions are approved, the new law would take effect in October. Given Japan’s criminal conviction rate of 99.8%, we expect a lot of fines and crowded cells if this passes.

Reactions to this proposal have been predictable. The Recording Industry of Japan (whose Chairman is also the CEO of Sony Music Entertainment of Japan) were immediately behind the revision, saying that it would help curb piracy, which is widespread in that country. On the other hand, the Japan Federation of Bar Associations think it best that piracy remain a civil matter, saying in a statement:

“Treating personal activities with criminal punishments must be done very cautiously, and the property damage caused by individual illegal downloads by private individuals is highly insignificant.”

Similarly, one of the country’s major newspapers, The Yomiuri Shimbun, reported about the story under the headline “Even One Click Is Now A Crime?” Also, hackers have apparently attacked the Japanese government’s website in protest.

We’ll keep an eye on this story and let you know about any major developments.

Source: Computerworld 

In a Seventh Circuit opinion out this month involving (of all things) an episode of South Park, the plaintiff-appellant may have shot itself in the foot by arguing about eDiscovery when it had not even requested discovery in the underlying litigation.

The Court noted that:

The expense of discovery . . . stressed at oral argument, looms over this suit . . . Ruinous discovery heightens the incentive to settle rather than defend these frivolous suits. But discovery would only follow a Rule 56 motion if the district court granted a request for discovery. District courts need not, and indeed ought not, allow discovery when it is clear that the case turns on facts already in evidence.

In this case, Brownmark did not request discovery. . . . Brownmark argues that it should be allowed to discover: the intent of SPDS at the time the episode was created; all relevant video images or clips, especially where such uses are divorced from the Episode; and pre-airing licensing information related to the Episode. We noted during oral argument that such a broad discovery request, surely entailing expensive ediscovery of emails or other internal communications, gives Brownmark the appearance of a “copyright troll.” We are confident that the district court would have refused to grant such expansive demands.

(emphasis added).

Sorry appellate lawyers- you too will need to learn eDiscovery!  The case is also the first to specifically address the legal significance of “Butters” wearing a teddy-bear suit (in the second footnote), a hotly debated topic in academic circles.

A federal judge this week ruled that Netflix may be liable for potential violations of the Americans with Disability Act (ADA). The National Association for the Deaf brought an action about the movies-and-TV-on-demand juggernaut, claiming that its pricing structure was discriminatory. Netflix’s streaming-only package is cheaper than its streaming+DVDs in the mail option, and the streaming library offers very little in the way of captions and subtitling. In effect, the complaint is that, in order to use Netflix, deaf customers have to pay more to receive physical DVDs, which more often than not, include subtitles.

Netflix countered this action by saying that it was exempt from the ADA’s reach, which Netflix argued only applies to physical locations and structures, and so it did not have any extra obligations to accommodate people with disabilities. But U.S. District Judge Michael Ponsor of Springfield, Mass., disagreed. Based on the legislative intent of the ADA, which was enacted in 1990, Ponsor felt that the law should proscribe any kind of discrimination, including over the internet.

Advocates for hard-of-hearing groups are delighted that the case has been allowed to go forward, while Netflix may yet appeal the ruling.

Source: SF Gate

It’s not every day that we get to talk about cyber squatting, libel, and judo all in the same story. At the center of this storm is one Marius Vizer, of Hungary, the president of the International Judo Foundation. Apparently, some people do not much care for Mr. Vizer, and set up the website vizernews.com which alleges that Vizer is a “suspicious businessman”, under the heading “Is this the kind of man you want in control of world judo?”

In response, Vizer filed an in rem action under the Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act (ACPA) against the people behind the website. His complaint alleged that the vizernews.com domain name was registered “with the bad faith intent to profit or otherwise trade on Plaintiff’s rights in his name,” but a quick look at the site indicates that there is no commercial aspect to it at all; it’s just some people on the Internet sounding off about someone they don’t like. (Just like approximately one-third of the Internet).

Thomas O’Toole’s blog at Bloomburg BNA has full details about all the ways in which Vizer’s lawsuit was doomed, culminating in being assigned one of the judges who was closely involved with the passing of the ACPA. It’s an interesting read, and worth a few minutes.

Source: Bloomburg BNA

You’re probably aware that earlier this month, 6 million user passwords were stolen from the popular networking site LinkedIn. Though the site, which has over 150 million members, has tried to make it clear that nobody’s accounts were compromised, a woman in Illinois just filed a federal action against LinkedIn, to the tune of $5 million. The plaintiff, Katie Szpyrka, accuses LinkedIn of “deceiv[ing] customers” with a security policy “in clear contradiction of accepted industry standards for database security,” and is seeking class action status.

LinkedIn maintains that only passwords were stolen, and not the corresponding email addresses, so the passwords themselves were useless, and that is why no user will have suffered any harm by this data breach. (Though they did recommend that everyone change their LinkedIn passwords just to be safe). Experts say that Szpyrka will have a tough time prevailing in this action, as she will have to show some specific, individualized harm that she has suffered. That said, there have been similar actions against other sites which have suffered data breaches, so perhaps she has a chance. And with the news we brought you yesterday, about the FTC starting to target companies that fail to sufficiently secure their data, maybe LinkedIn should be wary.

Source: Thomson Reuters News & Insight

You’ve probably never heard of an Anton Piller Order, which is a good thing for you. It operates both as an injunction and a civil writ for seizure. This means you can stop someone from doing something and take their stuff!

Like DirecTV being given “the right to enter . . . offices to ‘search for, examine, and remove or copy’ evidence of piracy-related activities including ‘the web sites, databases contained therein, electronic storage media and computer equipment.’ The order entitled DirecTV to remove or copy ‘any document, record, article, notes, information, instructions, correspondence, sent and received, electronic mail, howsoever stored, fixed, expressed or embodied. . . .’” in Freeman v. DirecTV, Inc., 457 F.3d 1001, 1003 (9th Cir. 2006).

Or Cisco being deputized to “enter [a] premises and to search for and seize any products or related materials with Cisco trademarks. Cisco executed the order two days later and seized more than $1 million in counterfeit Cisco products and close to $4 million in Cisco packaging and labels” in United States v. Kavalchuk, 2011-DNH-055 (D. N.H. 2011).

Don’t fret though- these two cases involved Canadian courts.  Just make sure to pay your DirecTV bill if you live in Canada. They don’t mess around.

Rhode Island just repealed a bizarre law that made it a crime to lie to people online (a misdemeanor with a $500.00 fine). ”[T]his law made virtually the entire population of Rhode Island a criminal . . . [w]hen this bill was enacted nobody had any idea what its ramifications were. Telling fibs may be wrong, but it shouldn’t be criminal activity[,]” according to Steven Brown, the executive director of the Rhode Island American Civil Liberties Union.  But Rhode Islanders- do not start fibbing willy-nilly- don’t forget about the Stolen Valor Act, which provides:

Whoever falsely represents himself or herself, verbally or in writing, to have been awarded any decoration or medal authorized by Congress for the Armed Forces of the United States, any of the service medals or badges awarded to the members of such forces, the ribbon, button, or rosette of any such badge, decoration, or medal, or any colorable imitation of such item shall be fined under this title, imprisoned not more than six months, or both.

18 U.S.C. § 704(b). The Act provides for jail terms of up to six months for most misrepresentations and up to a year for false statements that a person has received the Congressional Medal of Honor or other specified awards. Id. § 704(d).  Check out this Tenth Circuit opinion for more on the Stolen Valor Act. I am sure the promoters of the Wedding Crashers movie didn’t get the memo on the Stolen Valor Act when they (rather foolishly) did this.

In a first, the Federal Trade Commission sued a major company for “failure to maintain reasonable security” necessary to keep intruders from penetrating the hotel chain’s networks.  Allegedly, there were a series of security breaches where Russian hackers were able to generate over $10 million in fraudulent purchases.  Apparently this is part of the FTC’s effort to police how companies manage consumer information, and the FTC’s press release has more information.

Yesterday, we posted about Mark Spangler’s defense attorneys seeking a yearlong continuance, so they can sift through 2.5 terabytes of requested information. Based on a ruling that just came from the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, though, Spangler’s team may end up being denied. The Court upheld Lee Farkas’ convictions for bank, wire and securities fraud, and most pertinently, found that the lower court did not err in denying Farkas’ multiple requests for a continuance based on the 59 million pages of evidence that needed review.

As the FindLaw blog puts it:

The denial of a continuance contravenes a defendant’s Sixth Amendment right to counsel only when there has been “an unreasoning and arbitrary insistence upon expeditiousness in the face of a justifiable request for delay.” To prevail on this issue, Farkas had to show that the district court abused its discretion in refusing to continue the trial, and that the ruling “specifically prejudiced” his case.

When requesting his fourth motion for continuance, Farkas suggested that the “monumental discovery production justified the defense’s requests for continuances”, but given that the government had assisted in the document review, and that the court had already allowed for two continuances, the lower court properly denied the fourth motion.

Source: FindLaw 4th Circuit News & Information Blog