The case is Facebook, Inc. v. Power Ventures, Inc., 2010 WL 3291750 (N.D. Cal 2010) (Ware, J.), handed down July 20. It’s largely a replay of the legal issues raised by the Lori Drew case but under the California computer crime statute, Cal. Penal Code Sec. 502. In the case, Facebook sued a company (Power […]
Archive | Computer Crime Law
Jack Goldsmith on Cyber War
This week’s The New Republic features a cover story by Harvard Law School’s Jack Goldsmith on cyberwar. (June 24, 2010.) It’s a long, serious review essay, using Richard A. Clarke and Robert K. Knake’s new book, Cyber War, as the hook. But Jack goes well beyond a book review into the rapidly expanding literature on […]
The Internet, The Fourth Amendment, and Technology Neutrality: A Response to Horowitz
Defense attorney and blogger Rick Horowitz has posted an extended two-part response to my new law review article, Applying the Fourth Amendment to the Internet: A General Approach, 62 Stan. L. Rev. 1005 (2010). His posts are here: 1. Orin Kerr’s Fourth Amendment & The Internet: Foundations 2. What’s Wrong With Orin Kerr’s Technology Neutrality […]
The Next iPhone — and the Criminal Law Angle
It appears that an Apple employee with a top-secret next-generation iPhone prototype lost the phone at a bar. The folks at Gizmodo paid $5,000 to get the phone from the guy who recovered it. They then disassembled the phone to see what made it tick before contacting Apple to have Apple request the return of […]
Final Version of “Applying the Fourth Amendment to the Internet: A General Approach”
I’m pleased to say that the final version of my latest law review article is now online: Applying the Fourth Amendment to the Internet: A General Approach, 62 Stan. L. Rev. 1005 (2010). The abstract: This Article offers a general framework for applying the Fourth Amendment to the Internet. It assumes that courts will seek […]
DOJ Moots Constitutional Challenge to Getting an E-mail With Less Process Than a Warrant
I wrote about the dispute on Wednesday. I commented at the time: This is big news, and not just because it was mentioned on the Drudge Report. DOJ and some of the ISPs have been disagreeing about this issue quietly for years. What makes this case unusual is that the two sides have decided to […]
Does Federal Law Allow the Government to Obtain Opened E-mail With Less than a Warrant?
There’s an important e-mail privacy dispute brewing in Colorado: DOJ and Yahoo are clashing in court on the ground that the Ninth Circuit covered in its very weird opinion in Theofel v. Farey-Jones (2004), on whether the federal privacy law known as the Stored Communications Act allows the government to compel opened e-mail from an […]
Does Attaching a Thumb Drive to a Shared Computer Waive Fourth Amendment Rights in its Contents?
“Yes,” says Judge Maurice Paul in United States v. Durdley, 2010 WL 916107 (N.D. Fla. 2010), handed down on March 11. I haven’t seen any cases quite like this, but I tend to think the decision is wrong. In this post, I wanted to explain the decision and then say why I find its reasoning […]
Interesting “Unauthorized Access” Case
Readers who were interested in the Lori Drew case, and the question of when computer use counts as criminal “unauthorized access” to a computer, will want to read this New Jersey state case from last fall: State v. Riley, 12 N.J.Super. 162, 988 A.2d 1252 (2009) (link to google cache version). It’s a case on […]
“Cyber Civil Rights” Symposium
By David Kopel on March 22, 2010 4:19 pm in Blogosphere, Computer Crime Law, Cyberspace Law, Uncategorized
Danielle Citron Last year, Maryland law professor Danielle Citron published “Cyber Civil Rights” in the BU Law Review. Here’s the abstract: Social networking sites and blogs have increasingly become breeding grounds for anonymous online groups that attack women, people of color, and members of other traditionally disadvantaged groups. . . . Attackers manipulate search engines to […]
New Article, “Ex Ante Regulation of Computer Search and Seizure”
I have just posted a new draft article, Ex Ante Regulation of Computer Search and Seizure, forthcoming in the Virginia Law Review. The article is a response to dynamics that have been evolving over the last decade in the lower courts that were turned up to eleven by the Ninth Circuit’s en banc decision in […]
Eleventh Circuit Decision Largely Eliminates Fourth Amendment Protection in E-Mail
Last Thursday, the Eleventh Circuit handed down a Fourth Amendment case, Rehberg v. Paulk, that takes a very narrow view of how the Fourth Amendment applies to e-mail. The Eleventh Circuit held that constitutional protection in stored copies of e-mail held by third parties disappears as soon as any copy of the communication is delivered. […]
“Fourth Amendment Seizures of Computer Data”
The final version of my most recent article has been posted online: Fourth Amendment Seizures of Computer Data, 119 Yale L.J. 700 (2010).
A Few Thoughts on Robbins v. Lower Merion School District
Eugene links to the complaint in the school-provided-laptop-with-cameras case, and I wanted to offer a few thoughts on it from a legal standpoint. I’ll assume the school’s statement as to what happened is accurate, and the computer’s camera was turned on and a still photo was taken only when the school believed the laptop had […]
Thoughts on the Oral Argument in the Third Circuit Cell-Site Records Case
The Third Circuit held oral argument today in the case on the legal standard for historical cell-site information. I blogged about this important case here last week, and the oral argument audio from this morning has been posted here at the Third Circuit’s website. It was a very unusual and free-ranging argument that went for […]