The May 10, 2021 post The Donald Trump Twitter Case: Vacated and Dismissed as Moot by the Supreme Court reported how the U.S. Supreme Court dismissed Knight First Amendment Inst. at Columbia University v. Trump, in which the Southern District and Second Circuit found that then-President Donald Trump’s decision to block certain social media users from accessing his Twitter account was unconstitutional viewpoint discrimination. In its one paragraph decision, the Supreme Court failed to address the appeal on its merits, instead dismissing the case as moot because Donald Trump was no longer President. The Supreme Court now has another opportunity to consider whether public officials violate the First Amendment by blocking certain members of the public from commenting on the officials’ publicly accessible social media pages thanks to the Ninth Circuit case of Garnier v. O’Connor-Ratcliff.
Will it be the End of §230 as We Know It?
Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, 47 U.S.C. §230(c)(1) (hereafter “§230”), protects internet services, like Facebook, Twitter, and the like, from liability based on words used by third parties who use their platforms. The August 23, 2022 Trending Law Blog post discussed how on March 7, 2022, §230 staved off an attack by a private plaintiff in Texas, who challenged Facebook’s §230 protection, when the Supreme Court of the United States declined to decide whether §230 provided immunity from suit to internet platforms “in any case arising from the publication of third-party content, regardless of the platform’s own misconduct.” At that time, Justice Clarence Thomas stated that while he agreed the Texas matter was not appropriate for review by the Supreme Court, he did call for the Court “to address the proper scope of immunity under §230” in a future appropriate case. Apparently that case has arrived.
A Possible ‘High Noon’ for Social Media Platforms Looms at the Supreme Court
The August 13, 2021 Trending Law Blog post discussed how, in NetChoice, LLC v. Attorney General, State of Florida, the United States District court for the Northern District of Florida enjoined Florida from enforcing a law that targeted some, but not all, social media platforms based on the content of the speech hosted on their websites. Thereafter, the September 8, 2022 Trending Law Blog post discussed how in December 2021 a federal court in Texas enjoined enforcement of a law in the case of NetChoice, LLC v. Paxton which would have limited a large number of social media companies from moderating content. The Florida case was ultimately appealed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit while the Texas case was appealed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.
The NetChoice LLC Texas Case: Stay by Fifth Circuit Vacated by the Supreme Court
The December 16, 2021 post “Texas Enjoined from Enforcing Law Targeting Social Media Platforms” reported how on December 1, 2021 a federal court in Texas enjoined enforcement of a law which would have limited a large number of social media companies from moderating content on their websites.
Thereafter, on May 11, 2022, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit issued an Order which allowed the Texas law to go into effect, essentially staying the district court’s determination.
Section 230 Dodges Another Judicial Bullet
The June 10, 2020 and July 22, 2019 posts on Trending Law Blogs discussed, among other things, how Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, 47 U.S.C. §230 (c)(1) (hereafter “§230”), has come under attack by politicians who seek to remove the §230 immunity that protects internet platforms such as Google, Yahoo!, Microsoft and Facebook when they are sued for re-publishing content on their websites which is provided by a third-party.
On March 7, 2022, §230 staved off an attack by a private plaintiff in Texas who challenged Facebook’s §230 protection when the Supreme Court of the United States denied the plaintiff’s petition for certiorari. According to the Petition for Writ of Certiorari, the plaintiff claimed she was sex trafficked as a minor “because Facebook’s products connected her with a sex trafficker.” Facebook asserted it was “completely immune from suit” under §230. After the Texas Supreme Court ruled in favor of Facebook, plaintiff appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, asking the Court to rule on whether §230 provided immunity from suit to internet platforms “in any case arising from the publication of third-party content, regardless of the platform’s own misconduct.”
A Communication Data Warrant or Wiretap Order – Which is needed for Law Enforcement to Obtain ESI from Facebook?
In a recent case decided by the Appellate Division in New Jersey, Facebook, Inc. v. State of New Jersey, the court considered whether communication data wire warrants (“CDWs”) or wiretap orders had to be served on Facebook for law enforcement officers to obtain “prospective electronically stored information” from Facebook users as part of an ongoing criminal investigation. The court held that a CDW rather than a wiretap order was required. (The court additionally held that the duration of the particular CDWs – 30 days – was too lengthy under New Jersey’s search warrant procedures and had to be modified to a 10 day duration.)
In reaching this decision, the Appellate Division reversed decisions of two trial judges who each had ruled that wiretap orders – not CDWs – were needed to compel Facebook to turn over information, i.e., images, videos, audio files, posts, comments, histories, the contents of private messages, etc., it would collect prospectively from the subjects of the investigation. The CDWs sought “the ongoing disclosure of prospective electronic communications for thirty consecutive days, and the immediate disclosure of at least twice as many days’ worth of the historical communications.” Facebook provided all of the historical communications requested but moved to quash the CDWs to the extent they sought the contents of prospective electronic communications, contending that a wiretap order was needed to obtain those communications. (A wiretap order requires law enforcement to satisfy a significantly greater burden to be issued as compared to what must demonstrated to obtain a CDW.)
Always Click the User Agreement Link!
In a recent case decided by the Appellate Division in New Jersey – Vercammen v. LinkedIn Corp. – the court affirmed the dismissal of a lawsuit filed by a New Jersey attorney who had his LinkedIn premium membership terminated because of his alleged multiple violations of the social media network’s policies, even after he had been warned that his posting practices violated LinkedIn’s policies. LinkedIn terminated the attorney’s account because he was posting more than 15 articles per day (which exceeded the number of article members were permitted to post) and because he was using the articles to advertise his business in violation of the site’s Publishing Platform Guidelines.
All of the attorney’s claims – for breach of contract, breach of warranty, injunctive relief, negligence, fraud and consumer fraud – were dismissed with prejudice at the trial level, for among other reasons, the attorney’s failure to comply with the forum selection clause in LinkedIn’s User Agreement, which required disputes to be litigated in California.
Social Media Influencers Beware!
In Petunia Products, Inc. v. Rodan & Fields, LLC and Molly Sims, the United States District Court for the Central District of California held that a social media influencer – a person “presumed to have the power to affect the purchase decisions of others” – could be sued for direct trademark infringement in connection with the products the influencer endorsed.
In this case, the plaintiff, a cosmetics company, owned the BROWBOOST® trademark, which it used in connection with its eyebrow product. Defendant Rodan & Fields (“R&F”), a competitor of plaintiff, marketed its own eyebrow product called “Brow Defining Boost.” Plaintiff claimed the R&F product infringed on its trademark and that R&F’s promotion of its product on social media with the hashtag #BROWBOOST diluted plaintiff’s social media presence. Plaintiff also alleged that a social media blogging influencer employed by R&F, defendant Molly Sims, posted a blog which infringed on plaintiff’s trademark because the blog promoted the allegedly infringing product. Sims moved to dismiss the complaint, claiming plaintiff failed to adequately plead claims for direct trademark infringement, contributory infringement, false advertising, and unlawful and unfair business practices.
Texas Enjoined from Enforcing Law Targeting Some Social Media Platforms
The August 13, 2021 Trending Law Blog post discussed how the United States District court for the Northern District of Florida enjoined Florida from enforcing a law that targeted some, but not all, social media platforms based on the content of the speech hosted on their websites. On December 1, 2021, a federal district court in Western District of Texas, following arguments heard in NetChoice LLC v. Paxton, relied on the First Amendment and similarly enjoined Texas from enforcing a law which would have limited a large number of social media companies from moderating content on their websites.
The Texas statute – HB20 – prohibited certain social media companies from “censoring” users of a platform based on the users’ viewpoints. The statute, however, only applied to certain social media companies, i.e., ones with more than 50 million users and which allowed users to create accounts so they could communicate with others by posting information, images, comments or messages. The law also imposed disclosure and operational requirements on the social media platforms and allowed Texas users or people doing business in Texas to seek injunctive relief and attorneys’ fees if they believed their viewpoint speech had been improperly censored. The statute similarly allowed the Texas Attorney General (defendant Ken Paxton) to seek injunctive relief and attorneys’ fees for violations of the law. Two social media trade associations filed suit to prevent Texas from enforcing HB20 based on, among other grounds, the First Amendment.
Will a Decision of the High Court of Australia in a Case Involving Defamation and Social Media Have Ramifications Elsewhere?
On September 8, 2021, the High Court of Australia ruled 5-2 in Fairfax Media Publications Pty Ltd. v. Voller that media companies in Australia could be held liable for defamation as a result of comments left by third-parties on the companies’ social media pages. Although the case is not binding on courts in the United States, it could embolden plaintiffs here to pursue similar causes of action, so it
is worthwhile to review the facts and legal analysis set forth by the High Court in its Voller decision.
The facts of the case were fairly simple. The defendants, newspaper publishers and operators of television stations, maintained Facebook pages which hyperlinked to stories on the defendants’ websites. The defendants invited readers who used Facebook to comment about the articles on the media companies’ Facebook pages. The plaintiff, Dylan Voller, claimed that the companies posted news articles about his prior incarceration in a juvenile detention center, which resulted in comments alleged to be defamatory of him on the companies’ Facebook pages. Contending that the media companies were “publishers” of the comments made by readers of their Facebook pages, Voller filed suit.