Internet Law Commons^™

The Bias Of Neutrality: An Examination Of A Congressman's Motivations On The Issue Of Network Neutrality, Harrison Beau Bryant

e-Research: A Journal of Undergraduate Work

The United States Congress is an institution that, especially in recent times, is continuously faced with more modern and complex problems. The political dilemma surrounding the issue of network neutrality is a perfect example of a highly complex and technical problem that members of Congress have been forced to think about and act on. Because use of the Internet has now been almost entirely integrated into American society, with nearly 80% of the U.S. population connected in one way or another, the Internet's priority as a subject of legislation has seen a meteoric rise in Congress (data.worldbank.org; opencongress.org). In fact, …

Voice Over Internet Protocol: An International Approach To Regulation, Jimar Sanders

Georgia Journal of International & Comparative Law

No abstract provided.

How Much Spam Can Can-Spam Can?: Evaluating The Effectiveness Of The Can-Spam Act In The Wake Of White Buffalo Ventures V. University Of Texas, Fay Katayama

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

How Should The Past Inform The Future? Reviewing Regulating Internet Gaming: Challenges And Opportunities, Keith C. Miller

UNLV Gaming Law Journal

No abstract provided.

Reviving Implied Confidentiality, Woodrow Hartzog

Indiana Law Journal

The law of online relationships has a significant flaw—it regularly fails to account for the possibility of an implied confidence. The established doctrine of implied confidentiality is, without explanation, almost entirely absent from online jurisprudence in environments where it has traditionally been applied offline, such as with sensitive data sets and intimate social interactions.

Courts’ abandonment of implied confidentiality in online environments should have been foreseen. The concept has not been developed enough to be consistently applied in environments such as the Internet that lack obvious physical or contextual cues of confidence. This absence is significant because implied confidentiality could …

Determining The Location Of Injury For New York's Long Arm Statute In An Infringement Claim, Stefan Josephs

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Communication Decency Act Gone Wild: A Case For Renewing The Presumption Against Preemption, Ryan J.P. Dyer

Seattle University Law Review

Since its inception, the Internet has disseminated the most vital commodity known to man—information. But not all information is societally desirable. In fact, much of what the Internet serves to disseminate is demonstrably criminal. Nevertheless, in the effort to unbind the “vibrant and competitive free market” of ideas on the Internet, Congress enacted section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which essentially grants immunity to interactive computer service providers from liability for information provided by a third party. This Comment suggests that, in certain contexts, courts applying section 230 immunity should reexamine the preemptive effect Congress intended section 230 to …

The New Territorialism In The Not-So-New Frontier Of Cyberspace, William L. Reynolds, Juliet M. Moringiello

Faculty Scholarship

This Essay addresses the following questions: What jurisdictions should govern cyberspace problems? Are cyberspace problems different from those in the tangible world? If so, what are the implications for governance? We conclude that the judicial response to cyberspace governance has been mostly correct. After some adaptation problems (an early learning curve), courts have generally followed common law analogs to cyberspace problems. In other words, those problems are not treated as unique unless there is something special about the internet that suggests different resolutions are needed. There certainly is nothing to suggest that American courts or legislatures are trying to occupy …

A Fork In The Stream: The Unjustified Failure Of The Concurrence In J. Mcintyre Machinery Ltd. V. Nicastro To Clarify The Stream Of Commerce Doctrine, Cody Jacobs

Faculty Scholarship

A foreign manufacturer sells a product to an American distributor in State A, who then resells the product to an American consumer in State B. The consumer is injured by the product and attempts to sue the foreign manufacturer in State B. Can State B exercise personal jurisdiction over the manufacturer? This deceptively simple and seemingly common question, and related questions involving the socalled "stream of commerce," has fractured the United States Supreme Court for over twenty years, leaving consumers, manufacturers, and distributors unsure of their rights and potential liabilities. This Article focuses on a recent missed opportunity the Court …

Jurisdictional Limits Of In Rem Proceedings Against Domain Names, Michael Xun Liu

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

In 1999, Congress passed the Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act (ACPA) to combat “cybersquatters” who profited by registering domain names that were confusingly similar to established trademarks. Under the ACPA, trademark owners have a specific cause of action against domain name registrants accused of cybersquatting. Moreover, the law gives U.S. courts in rem jurisdiction over trademark infringing domain names registered to parties that are not subject to personal jurisdiction. Over the past decade, proceeding in rem against domain names has proven to be an effective strategy for trademark owners. While many companies have used the ACPA against cybersquatters, others have relied …

Adapt Or Die: Aereo, Ivi, And The Right Of Control In An Evolving Digital Age, Johanna R. Alves-Parks

Loyola of Los Angeles Entertainment Law Review

The advent of the Internet has had a great effect on the production, distribution, and consumption of television programming. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to ABC, Inc. v. Aereo, Inc. and will now review the issue of unlicensed digital distribution of copyrighted programming in its Spring 2014 term. This Comment will first briefly examine the origins and interconnection between television and digital media, culminating in a discussion of the repercussions of allowing unlicensed over-the-top retransmissions of network broadcast programming to continue to stream over the Internet. It will then examine the decisions in WPIX v. IVI, Inc., ABC, Inc. v. …

After Search Neutrality: Drawing A Line Between Promotion And Demotion, Daniel A. Crane

Articles

The Federal Trade Commission's (“FTC” or “the commission”) January 3, 2013 decision to close its longstanding investigation of Google1 brings to a close a flurry of discussion over the possibility that Google could become subject to a “search neutrality” principle in the United States. Although the Commission found against Google on several grounds, it rejected petitions from Google's critics to create a search neutrality principle as a matter of antitrust law. This essay briefly analyzes what remains of U.S. antitrust scrutiny of Internet search bias after the Google settlement. In particular, it suggests that a sensible line can be drawn …

Teenage Crowdfunding, Andrew A. Schwartz

Publications

Teenage startups are in the public interest and should be encouraged, yet the federal CARD Act of 2009 eliminated credit card financing for many such companies, cutting off an important source of early-stage business capital for teenage entrepreneurs. Since then, however, Congress passed the CROWDFUND Act of 2012 which will allow teenagers to raise early-stage financing through Internet crowdfunding. Teens, being masters of the Internet, are well positioned to exploit this new opportunity, with the upshot being that securities crowdfunding may become an important way for youthful entrepreneurs to fund their business dreams.

Regulating The Internet Of Things: First Steps Toward Managing Discrimination, Privacy, Security, And Consent, Scott R. Peppet

Publications

The consumer "Internet of Things" is suddenly reality, not science fiction. Electronic sensors are now ubiquitous in our smartphones, cars, homes, electric systems, health-care devices, fitness monitors, and workplaces. These connected, sensor-based devices create new types and unprecedented quantities of detailed, high-quality information about our everyday actions, habits, personalities, and preferences. Much of this undoubtedly increases social welfare. For example, insurers can price automobile coverage more accurately by using sensors to measure exactly how you drive (e.g., Progressive 's Snapshot system), which should theoretically lower the overall cost of insurance. But the Internet of Things raises new and difficult questions …

Pinterest And Copyright's Safe Harbors For Internet Providers, Michael W. Carroll

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

Has the time come to substantially revise the Copyright Act to better adapt the law to the ever-evolving digital environment? A number of influential sources appear to think so. If their initiatives gain momentum, it will be important to consider lessons learned from the first such effort fifteen years ago when Congress made far-reaching changes to copyright law by extending the term of copyright for twenty years and by enacting a package of reform proposals known as the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (“DMCA”). This Article intertwines the story of one important provision of the DMCA - safe harbors for Internet …

Trial By Google: Judicial Notice In The Information Age, Andrew Ferguson

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

This Article presents a theory of judicial notice for the information age. It argues that the ease of accessing factual data on the Internet allows judges and litigants to expand the use of judicial notice in ways that raise significant concerns about admissibility, reliability, and fair process. State and federal courts are already applying the surprisingly pliant judicial notice rules to bring websites ranging from Google Maps to Wikipedia into the courtroom, and these decisions will only increase in frequency in coming years. This rapidly emerging judicial phenomenon is notable for its ad hoc and conclusory nature – attributes that …

Rethinking Online Privacy In Canada: Commentary On Voltage Pictures V. John And Jane Doe, Ngozi Okidegbe

Faculty Scholarship

This article problematizes the use of the bona fide case standard as the legal standard for a court to order a third party Internet Service Provider ("ISP") to disclose subscriber information to a copyright owner in online piracy cases. It argues that ISP account holders have a reasonable expectation of privacy in their subscriber information. It contends that the current bona fide case standard affords a relatively low threshold of protection for Internet users’ subscriber information. The reason for which the article takes this position is that the bona fide case standard can be met solely by IP address evidence, …

Forget Me, Forget Me Not: Reconciling Two Different Paradigms Of The Right To Be Forgotten, Lawrence Siry

Kentucky Law Journal

In May of 2014, the Court of Justice of the European Union handed down its decision in the case of Google Spain SL v. Agencia Española de Protección de Datos. This landmark decision ignited a firestorm of debate over the "right to be forgotten": the right of users to withdraw information about themselves available on the internet. With concerns about the restriction of the freedom of expression on the internet, many commentators have criticized the decision as unworkable and dangerous. Others have recognized continuity in the development of privacy and data protection jurisprudence within the European courts. Meanwhile in …

Failing Expectations: Fourth Amendment Doctrine In The Era Of Total Surveillance, Olivier Sylvain

Faculty Scholarship

Today’s reasonable expectation test and the third-party doctrine have little to nothing to offer by way of privacy protection if users today are at least conflicted about whether transactional noncontent data should be shared with third parties, including law enforcement officials. This uncertainty about how to define public expectation as a descriptive matter has compelled courts to defer to legislatures to find out what public expectation ought to be more as a matter of prudence than doctrine. Courts and others presume that legislatures are far better than courts at defining public expectations about emergent technologies.This Essay argues that the reasonable …

Wireless Localism: Beyond The Shroud Of Objectivity In Federal Spectrum Administration, Olivier Sylvain

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

Recent innovations in mobile wireless technology have instigated a debate between two camps of legal scholars about federal administration of the electromagnetic spectrum. The first camp argues that the Federal Communications Commission (“FCC”) should define spectrum use rights more clearly and give spectrum licensees broad property rights in frequencies. The second camp argues that, rather than award exclusive licenses to the highest bidder, the FCC ought to open much, if not most, of the spectrum to unlicensed use by smartphones and tablets equipped with the newest spectrum administration technology. First, this Article shows that both of these camps comprise a …

Tollbooths And Newsstands On The Information Superhighway, Brad A. Greenberg

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

Countering the perception that speech limitations affecting distribution necessarily reduce access to information, this Essay proffers that copyright expansions actually can increase access and thereby serve important copyright and First Amendment values. In doing so, this discussion contributes to the growing literature and two recent Supreme Court opinions discussing whether copyright law and First Amendment interests can coexist.

Misplaced Misrepresentations: Why Misrepresentation-Of-Age Statutes Must Be Reinterpreted As They Apply To Children’S Online Contracts, Michelle A. Sargent

Michigan Law Review

The information age revolutionized the relationship between individuals and the internet. Today, children are the targets of online advertisements that lure them into accepting terms of service, thus entering into online agreements. While children may feel comfortable navigating websites, they are psychologically predisposed to be unsophisticated and impulsive actors online. Children lack the digital literacy to understand the implications of accepting website terms of service. Meanwhile, several states have misrepresentation-of-age statutes that prevent children from using the infancy doctrine to disaffirm online contracts because, in accepting the terms of service, children often represent that they are old enough to enter …

Rape Shield Laws And The Social Media Revolution: Discoverability Of Social Media--It's Not Private, Seth I. Koslow

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Identity Theft On Social Networking Sites: Developing Issues Of Internet Impersonation, Maksim Reznik

Touro Law Review

This Comment focuses on the dangers of social media sites when a person gains access to another's online account through two different methods: (1) stealing the third party's password, or (2) creating a completely fake profile and subsequently impersonating that person.

Should The Internet Exempt The Media Sector From The Antitrust Laws?, Thomas J. Horton, Robert H. Lande

All Faculty Scholarship

This article examines whether the "old media" and the "new media", including the Internet, should be considered to be within the same relevant market for antitrust purposes. To do this the article first demonstrates that proper antitrust consideration of the role of non-price competition necessitates that “news” and “journalism” be analyzed in two distinct ways. First, every part of the operations of a newspaper (or other type of media source), including its investigative reporting and local coverage, should be assessed separately. We present empirical evidence collected for this study which demonstrates that the old media continues to win the vast …

Unauthorized Televised Debate Footage In Political Campaign Advertising: Fair Use And The Dmca, Susan Park

Management Faculty Publications and Presentations

No abstract provided.

Net Neutrality: Preparing For The Future, Jennifer Wong

Journal of the National Association of Administrative Law Judiciary

No abstract provided.

Stop Being Evil: A Proposal For Unbiased Google Search, Joshua G. Hazan

Michigan Law Review

Since its inception in the late 1990s, Google has done as much as anyone to create an "open internet." Thanks to Google's unparalleled search algorithms, anyone's ideas can be heard, and all kinds of information are easier than ever to find. As Google has extended its ambition beyond its core function, however it has conducted itself in a manner that now threatens the openness and diversity of the same internet ecosystem that it once championed. By promoting its own content and vertical search services above all others, Google places a significant obstacle in the path of its competitors. This handicap …

Whose Social Network Account: A Trade Secret Approach To Allocating Rights, Zoe Argento

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

Who has the superior right to a social network account? This is the question in a growing number of disputes between employers and workers over social network accounts. The problem has no clear legal precedent. Although the disputes implicate rights under trademark, copyright, and privacy law, these legal paradigms fail to address the core issue. At base, disputes over social network accounts are disputes over the right to access the people, sometimes numbering in the tens of thousands, who follow an account. This Article evaluates the problem from the perspective of the public interest in social network use, particularly the …

Geographically Restricted Streaming Content And Evasion Of Geolocation: The Applicability Of The Copyright Anticircumvention Rules, Jerusha Burnett

Michigan Telecommunications & Technology Law Review

A number of methods currently exist or are being developed to determine where Internet users are located geographically when they access a particular webpage. Yet regardless of the precautions taken by website operators to limit the locations from which they allow access, it is likely that users will find ways to gain access to restricted content. Should the evasion of geolocation constitute circumvention of access controls so that § 1201 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act ("DMCA") applies? Because location data can properly be considered personally identifiable information ("PII"), this Note argues that § 1201 should not apply absent a …