Episode 61: My Dongle Was Circumvented
Library of Congress releases new DMCA anti-circumvention exemptions, 5th Circuit rules in favor of Fair Use under the DMCA’s anti-circumvention provisions, and a few major companies sued for using features in flash cookies.
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New DMCA Anti-circumvention Exemptions
Read about it on our blog.
Provisions in DMCA: 17 U.S.C. § 1201
5th Circuit, Section 1201, and MGE v. GE, No. 08-10521 (5th Cir. 2010)
Read about it on Ars Technica
Flash cookies: Valdez, et al. v. Quntcast, MySpace, Hulu, NBC, ESPN, et. al
Read about it on Ars Technica
Complaint (courtesy of Wired)
In other news, Ben and David Lu!! are traveling around the country and had to miss this week’s recording. Also, audio quality might be a little poor (some nasty background noise and a few bad audio splices while editing); apologies in advance.
Episode 55: It’s Just Like Starcraft!
Quon and SMS Privacy, AT&T Security Breaches, and FTC Wants to Save the Newspaper
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Quon and SMS Privacy
Analysis: Hints on texting privacy
The Opinion
AT&T Security Breaches
iPhone 4 Order Security Breach Exposes Personal Information
FBI Investigates iPad Data Breach
AT&T Explains iPad Security Breach
FTC Wants to Save Newspaper
Potential Policy Recommendations To Support The Reinvention Of Journalism
City of Ontario v. Quon Released
In a bit of a surprise, the Supreme Court released its opinion in Quon today. The case was argued in April, and the court reverses the 9th Circuit. The Supreme Court held that the search of the officer’s text messages was constitutional.
The court realized that there was some significance in the case, but resolved it purely on a whether the search was reasonable. More detailed analysis to come. We last discussed this case in podcast episode 31.
As of writing, we’re still waiting on Bilski, which was argued in November. It’s the only outstanding case from November.
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Posted in: Links on June 17, 2010
Episode 52: One Year Down
Twitter to Sell Trademarked Ad Terms, Senators Call to End Privacy Of Pre-Paid Phones, Apple v. GPL
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Twitter to Sell Trademarked Ad Terms
Twitter May Allow Competitors to Purchase Trademarks as Keywords for Sponsored Tweets
Senators Call to End Privacy of Pre-Paid Phones
Senators call for end to anonymous, prepaid cell phones
Apple v. GPL
GPL Enforcement in Apple’s App Store
More about the App Store GPL Enforcement
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Posted in: Podcast on May 31, 2010
Episode 50: Make Lime-aid out of LimeWire
The iPhone Search Warrant, Google Goofs with WiFi Data, and LimeWire held liable for Copyright infringement.
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iPhone Search Warrant
iPhone Investigation Documents Ordered Unsealed (Update1)
Roommate’s Tip Led Cops to iPhone Finder
The Warrant Application
Google Goofs with WiFi Data Privacy
Google Says It Collected Private Data by Mistake
WiFi data collection: An update
LimeWire held liable for Copyright Infringement
LimeWire Likely To Shut Down Soon
CopyWrong! Kimba Wood Squeezes the Juice Out of Limewire
The Opinion
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Posted in: Podcast on May 17, 2010
School District Releases Report in Spying Case
You should take everything in this story with a grain of salt. The Merion School District released a report compiled by its own investigators about the alleged spying by the school into the homes of students.
Essentially the school district is saying that, yes, the webcams took upwards of 30,000 pictures and 27,000 screen shots, but all that was a result of failing to deactivate the recovery software after a lost or stolen laptop was recovered.
The school’s explanation for the spying the resulted in the lawsuit:
The report says Robbins turned in his laptop with a broken screen and was issued a loaner on Oct. 20, but school officials quickly moved to retrieve it due to outstanding insurance fees. So the tracking program was activated from Oct. 20 to Nov. 4 and captured 210 webcam photographs and 218 screen shots, the report said.Although a technician confirmed on the first day of tracking that the laptop was “now currently online at home,” another official in the same department instructed him to keep the tracking on and later told investigators he thought he needed authorization to terminate it, the report said.
On Oct. 30, the report said, a technician saw a computer screen shot that “included an online chat that concerned him.” After consulting with a superior, he allowed school officials to look at the images.
So they loaned him the laptop, activated the software, and read his instant messages? Sure sounds like spying to me. Did anyone try calling the family to get the laptop back?
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Posted in: Links on May 6, 2010
Supreme Court Holds Argument in Quon
The Supreme Court yesterday held argument in Quon a case which presents the question of what, if any, privacy interest a state employee has in text messages sent over an alpha-numeric pager provided by his employer.
We covered this way back in podcast 31. This isn’t a great case to address this issue, largely because the police department says they told all the employees they had no expectation of privacy in the text messages they sent. There’s also a wrinkle in that the government says that Quon could have just paid for the overage and not have been subject to the search. Also, the Supreme Court didn’t seem to be able to wrap its head around alpha-numeric pagers, which is worrisome.
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Posted in: Links on April 20, 2010
School Spying Case Heats Up
The Pennsylvania school that was spying on students with laptop webcams, has now been accused of snapping thousands of pictures of students, contrary to their assertions that they used the technology sparingly.
If this proves to be true, the school is in a great deal more trouble than they were at the beginning of the case.
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Posted in: Links on April 17, 2010
Episode 45: A Very Federal Day
FCC v. Comcast, e-mail privacy, and DMCA constitutionality.
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FCC v. Comcast
The opinion
Evidence mounts that Comcast is targeting BitTorrent traffic
FCC May Change National Broadband Plan
Court to FCC: Back Off on ‘Net Neutrality’
11th Circuit on E-mail Privacy
The Opinion
When Courts No Longer Consider Email to be Private, What is Left?
Eleventh Circuit Decision Largely Eliminates Fourth Amendment Protection in E-Mail
Petition for Rehearing Filed
DMCA v. Free Speech
The Paper
Why The DMCA Is An Unconstitutional Restriction On Free Speech
DMCA takedowns: trampling on free speech rights?
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Posted in: Podcast on April 12, 2010
Episode 42: Two-For Tuesday
Just two stories this week: Summary Judgment motions in Viacom v. YouTube, and Netflix shuts down it’s second challenge.
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Motion Filed in Viacom v. YouTube
Read The Just-Unsealed Documents From The YouTube/Viacom Case Here
Broadcast Yourself
Netflix Cancels Second Challenge
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Posted in: Podcast on March 22, 2010
