The Rainmaker Blog : Law Firm Marketing and Business Development : The Rainmaker Institute : Stephen Fairley : Professional Legal Marketing. US judge orders hundreds of sites "de-indexed" from Google, Facebook. After a series of one-sided hearings, luxury goods maker Chanel has won recent court orders against hundreds of websites trafficking in counterfeit luxury goods.
A federal judge in Nevada has agreed that Chanel can seize the domain names in question and transfer them all to US-based registrar GoDaddy. The judge also ordered "all Internet search engines" and "all social media websites"—explicitly naming Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Bing, Yahoo, and Google—to "de-index" the domain names and to remove them from any search results. The case has been a remarkable one. Concerned about counterfeiting, Chanel has filed a joint suit in Nevada against nearly 700 domain names that appear to have nothing in common. When Chanel finds more names, it simply uses the same case and files new requests for more seizures. How were the sites investigated?
Keep it Legal: Social Media and the Stored Communications Act. Last month in my SocialFish blog post, Keep it Legal: Social Media and Hiring, I wrote about the legal issues around viewing an applicant’s or employee’s social networking sites and outposts. That post focused on looking at the public portion of a person’s networking sites (a legal activity if you don’t discriminate). However some employers have sought access to the private section of a person’s site or group which can lead to a violation of the federal Stored Communications Act of 1986 (18 U.S.C. 2701-12). The Stored Communications Act (SCA) makes it an offense for a person or entity to intentionally access without authorization a facility that provides electronic communications service. It is also illegal to intentionally exceed an authorization to access such a facility. The person or entity that obtains, alters, or prevents authorized access to a wire or electronic communication while it is in electronic storage can be fined or imprisoned.
The jury found for the plaintiffs. 200120_LEGAL%20ISSUES%20IN%20SOCIAL%20NETWORKING. Legal Implications Of Social Media. Employment Law Alert - May 2010: More On Social Media: LinkedIn Today, Gone Tomorrow. For many companies, social networking websites such as LinkedIn provide marketing and business development opportunities. But employers must take prudent, proactive measures to avoid unintended, perhaps disastrous, consequences.
Here's the problem: take, for example, LinkedIn, one of the most popular social networking sites for business. One of its primary features is to permit users to invite their personal contacts to become "Connections. " The problem is, those contacts can often be key customers or suppliers - precisely the people many companies want to keep secret from their competitors. Please see full alert below for more information. Firefox recommends the PDF Plugin for Mac OS X for viewing PDF documents in your browser. We can also show you Legal Updates using the Google Viewer; however, you will need to be logged into Google Docs to view them. Please choose one of the above to proceed!
LOADING PDF: If there are any problems, click here to download the file. New FTC Guidelines May Hold Companies Liable for Unsolicited Employee Endorsements. Legal Issues with Using Social Media. To embed, copy and paste the code into your website or blog: Legal issues with using social media LEGAL ISSUES FOR BUSINESSES TO CONSIDER WHEN USING SOCIAL MEDIA By: Marcus Lee Moore & Van Allen PLLC 100 N. Tryon Street, Ste 4700 Charlotte, NC 28202 marcuslee@mvalaw.com www.mvalaw.com Businesses are seeing the huge potential benefits from using social media. Companies increasingly are using Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, YouTube and other social media sites to promote their products and services, find employees, disclose information, receive customer feedback, and respond to negative publicity.
7 Elements of a Social Media Policy. This article provides companies with great insight on how to develop a comprehensive social media policy. Social media is important for branding, sales, and marketing. However, companies need to be smart and limit liability. Each company should limit risk and capitalize on the reward of social media. Firefox recommends the PDF Plugin for Mac OS X for viewing PDF documents in your browser. Navigating the Information Superhighway: Understanding the Impact of Social Media In the Workplace. Do’s and Don’t’s of Monitoring the Activities of Employees on Social Networking Sites. Social Media Policies Reduce Discovery Risks: Are You Prepared? The pervasive use of Social Media, such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and MySpace, has made Social Media websites fertile sources of discovery in lawsuits.
Unfortunately, the lack of clear legal precedent and many courts' lack of familiarity with Social Media have resulted in conflicting decisions regarding the ability to discover information from these websites. Earlier this year, in Crispin v. Christian Audigier, Inc., a federal court in California applied an electronic privacy law from 1986 to hold that messages and comments on Facebook and MySpace that were visible by only a select group of users were protected from discovery.
Two other decisions issued in the last two months, however, suggest that some courts are willing to allow liberal discovery of the content in a litigant's Social Media accounts. In one recent decision, a New York court in Romano v. Why Every Business Should Have A Social Media Policy. Words matter. Words can come back and bite you. Think before you speak.
These are all self-evident truths that no one is likely to dispute. Managing Legal Risks in Social Media. Having been an early adopter of Twitter, Facebook and other social networking services, I’ve developed more than a passing interest in the evolving law applicable to this fascinating new medium. This presentation for the SocialLex 2010 conference — the first devoted exclusively to law of social media — explores many of the interesting issues posed by the real-time Web. These include intellectual property, such as who owns user generated content, trademarks, employment, corporate and regulatory compliance, and potential regulation. A review of uncharted legal waters and a guide to navigating uncertainty in a Web 2.0 world. Social Networking from 9-5: Unique Legal Challenges Facing Employers. Seminar Overview: *Tools of the Trade *Why employees use social media *Why you should be concerned that employees use social media *Best practices for drafting and implementing a social media policy *Questions Please see full presentation below for more information.
© 2008 Venable LLP 1 Social Networking from 9-5: Unique Legal Challenges Facing Employers by James E. Firefox recommends the PDF Plugin for Mac OS X for viewing PDF documents in your browser. We can also show you Legal Updates using the Google Viewer; however, you will need to be logged into Google Docs to view them. Please choose one of the above to proceed! LOADING PDF: If there are any problems, click here to download the file.