Yesterday, a third court weighed in on the FTC’s proposed ban on non-competes, set to go into effect on September 4, 2024. Judge Corrigan of the United States District Court for the Middle District of Florida granted the plaintiff Properties of the Villages, Inc.’s (“POV”) motion to stay the effective date of the rule and…
Part 4 of a short series of reflections on Ofcom’s Illegal Harms consultation under the Online Safety Act 2023 (OSA). A significant proportion of the consultation’s discussion of Ofcom’s proposed Code of Practice recommendations — especially those involving proactive monitoring and detection of illegal content — is taken up with enumerating and evaluating safeguards to accompany each…
Read More “proactive illegality duties, safeguards and proportionality” »
Assiduous readers of this blog will know of my fondness for working through concrete examples to illustrate how, once they come into force (now likely to be in Spring next year), platform illegal content duties under the UK Online Safety Act 2023 (OSA) might pan out in practice. A recurring theme has been that making…
The Globe and Mail published my op-ed yesterday on antisemitism and what I think are two states of disbelief: the disbelief among far too many in Canada that rising antisemitism is real, alongside the disbelief by many within the Jewish community that antisemitism has returned in a manner unseen since the Holocaust. An open access…
We’re suffering from “information disorder,” according to a report recently issued through the Aspen Institute. That’s not news. But how to solve this problem is the big issue, and the commission’s answer is that it will require substantial legal changes, as well as action by platforms, professionals, and academics. Legal responses to our disinformation pandemic…
Read More “Disinformation report suggests major legal reforms” »
[I missed this opinion when it first came out in 2023. Blogging for completeness because of the importance of the “reasonable Internet user” standard.] Klarna offers a “buy now, pay later” option to consumers at third-party e-commerce sites. If a consumer chooses to pay with Klarna, it divides the bill into 4 equal amounts and…
Jimmy Buffett once eloquently said that “without geography, you’re nowhere.” But how does that insight apply to restrictive covenants that lack explicit geographic limitations in Georgia? While Jimmy never got to find out, we now have some much-needed clarity from the Georgia Supreme Court. For many years, most Georgia litigants, individuals, and businesses operated under…
Utah’s Minor Protection in Social Media Act contains two major provisions. First, it requires social media companies to conduct age assurance of their users to a 95% accuracy rate, along with an appellate process for misclassified users. Second, once minors are segregated: social media companies must “set default privacy settings to prioritize maximum privacy” (giving…
Read More “Court Enjoins the Utah “Minor Protection in Social Media Act”-NetChoice v. Reyes” »
The future of privacy rights in the United States of America is uncertain. Many states have passed a patchwork of privacy laws, but there is no federal law that protects the privacy rights of U.S. residents. In 2022, instead of strengthening privacy rights on the federal level, the focus has been on weakening privacy rights….
As anticipated, TikTok and ByteDance have initiated legal action against the U.S. government, challenging a recently enacted law that would ban TikTok unless ByteDance sells the company off in the next nine months to an entity not controlled by a foreign adversary. Petitioners argue that the law infringes on constitutional rights in several ways: the…
Read More “A full rundown of the Constitutional issues – Attorney Evan Brown” »
