- Debt collectors are using social media more and more frequently to try to track down people who owe money, but they are bound by restrictions in the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act when they do so, just as if they used traditional means.
- The controversial “right to be forgotten” recently received another boost when a Canadian court required Google to remove specific search results worldwide. Under an interim injunction issued by the Supreme Court of British Columbia, Google must cease indexing or referencing in its search results certain websites related to a protracted intellectual property dispute between two corporations. Google has announced that it will appeal the ruling.
- The American Bar Association has voted to take the view that attorneys are allowed to scour the publicly available social-media postings of jurors, but they are ethically not permitted to friend jurors.
- In other “legal ethics meet social media” news, the New York State Bar Association has determined that tweets directed to potential clients in shareholder lawsuits constitute “advertisements” that, while not prohibited, must be labeled as “attorney advertising” and retained for at least one year. Further, such tweets constitute “solicitations” and are subject to certain filing requirements if directed to New Yorkers.
