Important Court Decisions Chip Away At ISP Liability Shield

An anonymous reader writes "News.com is reporting on a pair of court cases that could prove very important to ISPs in coming years. They both subtly chip away at the legal shield service providers have enjoyed against liability for hosted content. Further court cases could result in a 'chilling effect' on social networks and hosting services, as small businesses steer clear of potentially contentious content. '[The judge's ruling] differed from previous opinions in one important area. He refused to dismiss Jane Doe's argument that FriendFinder's republication of her profile invaded her 'intellectual property rights' under New Hampshire law. She claimed to be concerned about violations to her 'right of publicity,' which says an individual generally has the right to control how his name, image, and likeness is used commercially--and the court ruled that Doe's argument fell into the category of intellectual property law.'"

What about the fact they are scanning the stream?

[LiquidCoooled]

How can they hide behind a shield of common carrier with one hand and then start scanning content with the other?

Its not just liability for hosted content, but downloaded content as well.
If they want to stop us downloading illicit music, they should prevent us from downloading ALL illegal material as well or else face the wrath of the parents.

Yes and no

[esocid]

On one hand I agree that public information can be used, since it is in the public domain, but in a case where some company uses your name and likeness without your knowledge or permission is a real shitty move. However this doesn't look like the case. The profiles were made by other users, and were fake. All she had to do was contact those companies and report it, not take them to court. I have to side with those websites here because this sets a bad precedent that will bog the courts down even more with lawsuits.

I'm confused...

[San-LC]

From TFA:

"Jane Doe accused FriendFinder of causing her various sorts of harm by allowing "bogus" sexually explicit profiles that could be "reasonably identified" as portraying herself to be published without her knowledge by someone else to its Web properties, as well as in snippets in FriendFinder advertisements on search engines and other third-party Web sites."

So, from the wording, it sounds like she is suing because of the possibility of this happening, not the actual occurrence. Or am I just misreading the article? Does this entail those stupid IP-grabber ads on websites that show pictures with "Meet 20 year olds from (LOCATION BY IP)" above them?

And then comes EU...

[mi]

Just yesterday, we were informed [slashdot.org], that it may be illegal for Europeans to even use GMail, because that's exporting data "to a country that does not meet European standards for personal data protection".

What seems like a "big win for consumers" usually chills business — including (or especially) the small business — the kind without on-staff lawyers and lobbyists.

For example, I run my own mail-server — is it illegal for Europeans to contact me, because I can not (and would not) spend any time evaluating my data-protection standards for some bureaucrat?

The bigger point here is that all regulation is a headache, but public opinion, politicians, and "media" (Slashdot editors and users included) portray some regulation (which they approve of) favorably, while decrying the negative effects of the rest (without mentioning its benefits).

Re:Which IP? Defamation != IP

[Anonymous Coward]

> Just using "IP" confuses the issue, please stop using it.

Your wasting your time on this. The "IP" nonsense came along with WIPO and appeals to those who gain from equating civil infringement with criminal theft. Laymen who use the term are just demonstrating their malleability.

The basic tool for the manipulation of reality is the manipulation of words. If you can control the meaning of words, you can control the people who must use the words. -- Philip K. Dick, How To Build A Universe That Doesn't Fall Apart Two Days Later (1978)

If we're to stop it in it's tracks, we need to get the world non-intellectual non-property organization to change its name.

Re:They don't.

[niobium]

DCMA Section 202, Sub-Section 512, Paragraph (a) provides for common carrier status in all but name.

It does nothing of the kind, unless if by "all but name" you really mean "that it limits the liability of copyright infringement for service providers without any of the pesky regulations otherwise imposed on common carriers." ISPs derive their protections against liability of customer content from the CDA [wikipedia.org] and (as you point out) the DMCA. However, ISPs are not subject to mandatory regulation under Title II of the Communications Act. The [cybertelecom.org] FCC [cybertelecom.org], Congress [loc.gov], and the [findlaw.com] courts [aol.com] all agree that ISPs are NOT common carriers.