Aaron Rubin

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Firm/Organization: Morrison & Foerster LLP
Blogs: Socially Aware Blog

Latest Articles

As consumers increasingly communicate and interact through social media platforms, courts have had to grapple with how to apply existing laws to new ways of communicating, as well as disseminating and using content. Sometimes, however, traditional legal standards apply to these new platforms in a straightforward manner. At least, that is what the court found in Dancel v. Groupon, Inc., a putative class action against Groupon, Inc., alleging that Groupon’s use of images originally…
In what is being described as “the first settlement to deem such sales illegally deceptive,” New York Attorney General Letitia James has entered into a settlement with a company that had been selling fake followers, likes and views on several social media platforms. Read how much revenue the sales were generating for the defendant companies. Twitter is requiring parties interested in posting ads related to the European Parliament elections to verify their identities and …
As we have noted previously, the California Court of Appeal’s Hassell v. Bird decision in 2016 upholding an injunction requiring Yelp to remove certain user reviews was discouraging to social media companies and other online intermediaries, as well as to fans of Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act and proponents of Internet free speech generally. The recent California Supreme Court decision reversing the Court of Appeal was, therefore, met with considerable relief…
Just over a month after the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) took effect, California passed its own sweeping privacy legislation, the California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018. The Act stands to affect countless global companies doing business in California, many of which recently devoted extensive time and resources to GDPR compliance. These companies must now determine what additional steps are necessary to comply with the Act by the time it takes effect on January…
An advertising executive who lost his job after being named on an anonymous Instagram account is suing the now-defunct account for defamation. The suit names as defendants not only the account—Diet Madison Avenue, which was intended to root out harassment and discrimination at ad agencies—but also (as “Jane Doe 1,” “Jane Doe 2,” et cetera) several of the anonymous people who ran it. Whether Instagram will ultimately have to turn over the identities of the…
Finding that President Trump’s Twitter feed constitutes a public forum, a federal judge in New York City held that it’s a First Amendment violation when the President or one of his assistants blocks a Twitter user from viewing or responding to one of the President’s tweets. As the New York Times points out, the decision “is likely to have implications far beyond Mr. Trump’s feed and its 52 million followers.” A blog post on the…
With the effective date of the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) less than one month away, companies subject to the GDPR are racing to comply with the regulation’s data privacy laws. But, for those companies, May 25 doesn’t represent a finish line as much as it does a starting gate. In the coming months, as the most thorough and efficient methods of complying with the GDPR’s requirements come to light, the compliance processes that…
Based on copyright infringement, emotional distress and other claims, a federal district court in California awarded $6.4 million to a victim of revenge porn, the posting of explicit material without the subject’s consent. The judgment is believed to be one of the largest awards relating to revenge porn. A Socially Aware post that we wrote back in 2014 explains the difficulties of using causes of action like copyright infringement—and state laws—as vehicles for fighting…
In a decision that has generated considerable controversy, a federal court in New York has held that the popular practice of embedding tweets into websites and blogs can result in copyright infringement. Plaintiff Justin Goldman had taken a photo of NFL quarterback Tom Brady, which Goldman posted to Snapchat. Snapchat users “screengrabbed” the image for use in tweets on Twitter. The defendants—nine news outlets—embedded tweets featuring the Goldman photo into online articles so that the…
As we have noted previously, YouTube users sometimes object when the online video giant removes their videos based on terms-of-use violations, such as artificially inflated view counts. In a recent California case, Bartholomew v. YouTube, LLC, the court rejected a user’s claim that the statement YouTube posted after it removed her video, which allegedly gave the impression that the video contained offensive content, was defamatory. Joyce Bartholomew is a musician who creates what she…