Consumer law and regulation has been thrusted into the limelight in recent months. The main reason for this is the introduction of the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act (DMCC Act), which received Royal Assent on 24 May 2024. The changes introduced by the DMCC Act are significant and will result in both increased consumer … Continue Reading
Last month, viral AI-generated pornographic pictures of Taylor Swift circulated on X (formerly Twitter), with one post remaining for 17 hours and receiving more than 45 million views, 24,000 reposts, and hundreds of thousands of likes before the verified account was suspended for violating platform policy. The images, allegedly created using a company’s text-to-image tool … Continue Reading
On September 18, 2023, NetChoice, LLC — a national trade association with members from the tech and social media industry — obtained a preliminary injunction from the District Court for the Northern District of California preventing the State of California from enforcing the California Age-Appropriate Design Code Act (“AADC” or the “Act”). The reason? The … Continue Reading
The news about Steven Schwartz, the attorney who asked ChatGPT, an artificial intelligence chatbot, to find cases relevant to his client’s lawsuit only to submit a brief full of bogus caselaw, spread gleefully fast, as embarrassing news does. And although we shook our heads in disapproval, I suspect many attorneys were grateful to Mr. Schwartz. … Continue Reading
Reasoning that the form of a copyright registration does not really matter, the Ninth Circuit recently affirmed a district court’s ruling that real estate photography provider VHT was entitled to statutory damages for 2,700 photos infringed by Zillow even though VHT had registered all of the works at issue as part of a single database. … Continue Reading
According to the UK’s Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport report on influencer culture, the global sector is expected to grow from $6.0 billion in 2020 to $24.1 billion by 2025, at a compound annual growth rate of 32%. Influencer marketing offers brands a unique opportunity to target and connect with online communities, using … Continue Reading
A track called “Heart on My Sleeve” went viral recently on social media with lead vocals sounding eerily similar to a certain crooner known for his lovelorn lyrics. The pantomimed artist was Drake, no stranger to thirsty pining, backed by R&B artist The Weeknd. The song, however, was credited to Ghostwriter977, the alias of an … Continue Reading
A federal district court in New York held that the Internet Archive’s Open Library project was engaging in copyright infringement by publishing digital copies of millions of books online. Even though the Internet Archive and participating libraries purchased print copies of the books and, for the most part, made them available to borrowers on a … Continue Reading
“[N]o legacy is so rich as honesty”1 might fairly summarize the Federal Trade Commission (FTC)’s theme to the advertising industry for 2023, as gleaned from the National Advertising Division (NAD) 2022 Annual Report. “FTC leadership,” the NAD Report elaborates, “sent a consistent, strong message that national advertisers should take a hard look at their own … Continue Reading
Competition in the world of online sales is intense, but companies that used inflated original prices to lure customers face consequences. JC Penny, for example, has been hit with a class action lawsuit in the Southern District of California over its alleged advertising practice of using “false reference pricing.” The three-count complaint claims the nationwide … Continue Reading
The concept of Metaverse as an online framework for economic interoperability was born in and around 2020. Since then, giant companies all over the world ― especially in the IT, entertainment and fashion businesses ― have begun to launch products and solutions related to the ever developing Metaverse. Fashion brands, artists and entertainers, among others, … Continue Reading
Last month, in an important ruling for Internet service providers, and anonymous users alike, a new defense is taking shape to subpoenas issued pursuant to the “unmasking” provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (“DMCA”). Specifically, in In re DMCA § 512(h) Subpoena to Twitter, Inc., N.D. Cal. Case No. 20-mc-80214, district judge Vince Chhabria … Continue Reading
The European Commission published the preliminary results of its IoT sector inquiry and tech giants come under pressure for the alleged “gatekeeper” role that their voice assistant apps (such as Siri, Alexa, and Google Assistant) play in smart homes and with other connected consumer devices. The EU sector inquiry has so far collected over 200 … Continue Reading
On June 2, technology companies and copyright holders testified before Congress about the effectiveness of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act’s (DMCA) “safe harbor” provision. These testimonies came after the U.S. Copyright Office released its long-anticipated May 21 report, which studied and discussed DMCA’s effectiveness and the safe harbor provision.… Continue Reading
In the course of infringement proceedings, the right-holder may request an infringer and/or other involved persons (e.g. intermediaries such as an online video-sharing platform in this case) to provide name and address of users-infringers. But what does the notion of ‘address’ refer to? Would the provision of other than a postal address (such as email … Continue Reading
The U.S. Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) continues to focus on influencer advertising, as part of its consumer protection mission. On November 5, 2019, the FTC released an instructive “Disclosure 101” Guide and “Advice for Social Media Influencers” video to help influencers understand their legal obligations when they are spreading their influence through social media posts, … Continue Reading
On Thursday 11 July 2019, the UK government confirmed that it will bring forward legislation for a new Digital Services Tax (DST) to take effect from April 2020. Squire Patton Boggs’ Tax team have prepared an alert, analysing the proposed legislation and assessing its possible impact and wider implications, which can be downloaded here. For more information, please contact Jeff VanderWolk.… Continue Reading
In a landmark decision, the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) in the UK recently ruled that, for the purposes of the CAP Code at least, a social media user may be considered a celebrity where they have 30,000 followers or more. In this case, the ASA found that an influencer breached the CAP Code when she … Continue Reading
With childhood obesity rates in the UK among some of the worst in Europe, the Government has set a national target to halve childhood obesity by 2030. Whilst the Government acknowledges that this is a multi-faceted problem, it has reported that evidence suggests that children’s exposure to advertising of products that are high in fat, … Continue Reading
In 2016 the EU proposed the “Directive on copyright in the Digital Single Market” (the Directive). Since then, the Directive has been widely debated at EU level and has been the subject of intense campaigning and lobbying, with various interested parties writing numerous open letters to the EU Council’s Working Party on Intellectual Property, the … Continue Reading
Earlier this month the ASA announced its new strategy, More Impact Online, which aims to advance its regulation of online advertising over the next five years. The strategy has been developed following consultation with consumers, industry organisations and the government, and recognises the need for the ASA to move forward and adapt to the changing … Continue Reading
Recent jurisprudence rendered by Spanish Courts establishes that in the case of copyright infringement over the internet, it is not necessary to sue the infringer, but rather the IT intermediaries that host the website. The Court of Appeal in Barcelona has now dismissed an appeal filed by several IT companies against the first instance Judgment … Continue Reading
The European Commission has issued a press release announcing that the European Parliament, the Council and the Commission have reached a political agreement to end unjustified geoblocking for consumers wishing to buy products or services online within the EU. Geoblocking occurs when a customer is treated differently based on their nationality, place of residence or location … Continue Reading
On December 2, 2016, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC or Commission) published its Consumer Broadband Privacy Report and Order in the Federal Register. The Report and Order, released by the FCC on Wednesday, November 2, 2016—just one week after adoption—imposes significant restrictions on the use of sensitive customer proprietary information by retail broadband internet access … Continue Reading
