With Western democracies and emerging authoritarian states alike facing new threats from the rise of the Internet and social media, the temptation to try and regain control through censorship may grow. Some experts say such attempts could backfire and jeopardize the legitimacy of governments, fuel fresh unrest and make it harder to gather intelligence and information.
Zynga, the San Francisco maker of popular online games such as "FarmVille" and "CityVille," is being sued for patent infringement by a Texas gaming startup. Agincourt claims Zynga is violating two of its patents related to systems for redeeming prizes in games.
Major websites such as MSN.com and Hulu.com have been tracking people's online activities using powerful new methods that are almost impossible for computer users to detect, new research shows. Hulu and MSN were installing files known as "supercookies," which are capable of re-creating users' profiles after people deleted regular cookies, according to researchers at Stanford University and University of California at Berkeley.
A group of music publishers that joined a class action lawsuit filed against YouTube in 2007 have reached a settlement with Google's video-sharing site. The National Music Publishers Association as well as individual music-publishing companies, such as Cherry Lane Music Publishing Company, the Harry Fox Agency, and Murbo Music Publishing, joined a class action lawsuit filed against Google by The Football Association Premier League among others.
Rod Beckstrom, chief executive of the Internet Corp. for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), which oversees the Internet address system, plans to leave the organization next July. Mr. Beckstrom plans to complete his three-year contract with ICANN, a term that has been marked by moves to expand and internationalize the Internet address system.
A teenager who posted a message on his Facebook wall encouraging people to vandalize a shop during riots last week has avoided court. Police have told the 19-year-old to write a letter of apology to the shop owner as punishment.
Google is hoping to head off some of the complaints Oracle has made against it by asking a California judge for permission to file summary judgment on four issues. In one of the requests, Google asks the judge to rule that should Oracle win, it should only collect damages starting when it first gave notice to Google that it was infringing the patents, in July 2010.
Apple has been sued by a group of about 27,000 South Koreans in a class-action lawsuit over alleged privacy violations related to location services on iPhones, iPads and the iPod Touch. The suit, filed in Changwon, South Korea, seeks about 27 billion won, or about $26 million, in damages, which would work out to about $930 for each plaintiff, the Associated Press reports.
An online advertising coalition urged the nonprofit responsible for the Internet's address system to reverse its decision to allow for new domain names. The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), which represents media and technology companies that sell online advertising, said the plan from the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) would result in "incalculable financial damage to brand owners."
Facebook Inc. says it's discovered the "authentic contract" signed by its chief executive officer, Mark Zuckerberg, and Paul Ceglia, the western New York man who claims he's entitled to part-ownership of the company. The contract doesn't mention Facebook and was found on Ceglia's computer, embedded in electronic data from 2004, a year after Ceglia claims he and Zuckerberg signed the contract on which he basis his claim, according to papers filed by Palo Alto, California-based Facebook in federal court in Buffalo, New York.
Two young British men have been jailed for four years for using Facebook to incite disorder, although their posts were not connected to recent riots in London and other cities, the BBC reports. Jordan Blackshaw, 20, from Marston and Perry Sutcliffe-Keenan, 22, from Warrington were arrested after last week's outbreaks of violence.
Verizon Communications Inc. said Google Inc.'s $12.5 billion bid for Motorola Mobility Holdings Inc. was a welcome development because it may bring "stability" to a recent slate of smartphone patent disputes, though it stopped short of totally endorsing the proposed acquisition. "Google should be in a much better position to protect itself and its partners from legal attacks," said Robert W. Baird & Co. analyst William Power, noting that Libertyville, Ill.-based Motorola has an additional 7,500 patents pending.
Smartphone maker HTC Corp sued Apple Inc, seeking to halt U.S. imports and sales of Macintosh computers, iPads, iPods, iPhones and other devices because of alleged patent infringements. HTC said it filed complaints with the U.S. International Trade Commission and the U.S. District Court in Delaware.
Samsung can sell its latest iPad rival in most of Europe again after a German court lifted most of an injunction it had imposed at Apple's request. The Duesseldorf regional court said it was questionable whether its authority extended to international companies operating outside Germany, so it restricted a preliminary ban imposed last week on Samsung Electronics to Germany.
Already under investigation by regulators in the U.S. and Europe, Google likely will have to quell a couple of tricky antitrust questions as part of completing the $12.5 billion acquisition of Motorola Mobility, antitrust experts say. One set of challenges could come from the top makers of Google Android smartphones, most of whom issued perfunctory statements welcoming the deal.
In preparation for a new triple-x Internet domain that will launch in December, lawyers for the most storied brands in the United States are scrambling to prevent an x-rated rip-off of an invaluable asset: corporate Web addresses. The domain operator administering the .xxx domain is accepting early applications from brand owners who want control over their names.
An estimated 8 million Web pages have been hijacked and set up to take control of the computers of unsuspecting site visitors, U.S. security researchers said. In a new style of hacking on the Internet, the sites are mostly those of smaller merchants and professional companies, Web site security company Armorize said.
A coalition of health, welfare and social services advocates is calling for a boycott of Amazon.com Inc. until the Internet retailer drops a referendum to repeal a new law requiring it to collect sales taxes on Californians' purchases. At a news conference on the steps of the state Capitol, the Think Before You Click campaign asked shoppers to cancel accounts with the Seattle-based company.
Several members of Congress praised the Federal Trade Commission for settling charges with a mobile app developer accused of invading the privacy of tens of thousands of children, but the lawmakers say more needs to be done to protect kids online. The FTC accused Broken Thumbs Apps, owned by W3 Innovations, of collecting personal information from children who submitted comments and blog posts to the online character "Emily."
As the school year resumes, Missouri teachers will have to think twice about making private contact with students on Internet sites such as Facebook. The state's school districts are under orders to draft policies to comply with a new law restricting such communications in an effort to prevent inappropriate relationships between teachers and students.
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The GigaLaw Firm helps companies of all sizes protect their brands online, using domain name dispute policies – such as the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP) – and other legal tools available to copyright and trademark owners on the Internet.