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Good morning. The scope of legal protections for generative AI technology could be in focus when the U.S. Supreme Court rules in a pending case about YouTube’s algorithms. Plus, what’s next after the justices’ order preserving abortion pill access, and the oldest active judge in the U.S. speaks with Reuters about a probe over her workplace performance. On today’s docket, the first NFT insider trading case heads to trial, and tobacco giant Altria faces its first trial over claims it helped to fuel the teen vaping epidemic. More below on the big week in the courts. Let’s dive in!
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A pending U.S. Supreme Court case about the scope of a legal shield for tech companies regarding online content could have implications for technologies like artificial intelligence chatbot ChatGPT, Andrew Goudsward reports.
The justices are due to rule by the end of June whether YouTube can be sued over its video recommendations to users. The court showed some uncertainty at oral arguments in February over whether to weaken the shield known as “Section 230,” which says online companies are not liable for information provided by their users.
Technology and legal experts told Goudsward that the high court’s ruling could influence the debate over whether companies that develop generative AI chatbots should be shielded from claims such as defamation or privacy violations. The algorithms that power generative AI tools operate in a similar way as those that suggest videos to YouTube users.
Democratic U.S. Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon drew a distinction between AI tools that “create content” and platforms that host it. “Section 230 is about protecting users and sites for hosting and organizing users’ speech,” Wyden told Reuters. “It should not protect companies from the consequences of their own actions and products.”
>>> Read more: Factbox: Governments’ efforts to regulate AI tools
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- New York joined the growing list of states reporting a significant pass rate drop for the February 2023 bar exam. The overall pass rate on its most recent attorney licensing exam fell to 40% from 45% last year, according to the New York Board of Law Examiners. New York’s first-time pass rate also declined from 61% in 2022 to 56% this year. (Reuters)
- A California federal judge won’t sanction VW over one of its managing agent’s refusal to sit for a deposition with the SEC in its diesel emissions case against the German automaker. VW had not acted in “bad faith” in its effort to convince the employee to submit to questions by the securities agency, U.S. Magistrate Alex Tse said in an order. VW and its lawyers at Sullivan & Cromwell have denied liability in the SEC case arising from the company’s emissions-cheating scandal. (Reuters)
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That’s the number of lawyers and others who may have had their log-in information stolen after a breach at the American Bar Association. The national lawyer group said in an update on its website and email notices that an unauthorized third party penetrated its network last month and took usernames and passwords for online accounts used to access an old ABA website and its career center before 2018. An ABA spokesperson said the organization has “no indication” the information has been misused. The legal industry has been the target of growing cybersecurity attacks, including against law firms that often possess valuable confidential client information.
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Fox News and Fox Corp have long suspected that voting tech company Smartmatic USA had some kind of outside funding for its $2.7 billion lawsuit accusing the network of spreading election fraud lies. In Fox’s view, Smartmatic doesn’t have enough cash to mount a fight against the network’s high-priced team. Someone else, it reasoned, was funding the case. Fox litigated for more than a year to find out who, arguing that any funder’s identity was crucial to Fox’s counterclaim casting doubt on Smartmatic’s true motives for suing the network. Last month, Fox won a ruling that Smartmatic must disclose any agreements with outside funders. And last week, Fox filed the counterclaim. So who is backing Smartmatic? Alison Frankel has the answer, which likely came as a surprise to Fox.
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“I doubt that my elderly colleagues would have joined such a statement.“
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- Tobacco company Altria heads to trial in a lawsuit by San Francisco’s public school district accusing the company of fueling a teen vaping epidemic, along with e-cigarette maker Juul. The San Francisco Unified School District says teachers and staff “have had to go to extreme lengths to respond to the ever-growing number of students using e-cigarettes on school grounds,” and is seeking to force Altria to pay for the cost of tackling the problem. Altria, represented in the case by Beth Wilkinson of Wilkinson Stekloff, faces thousands of similar actions from individuals, local governments and states. The plaintiffs are represented by firms including Lieff Cabraser and Keller Rohrback. U.S. District Judge William Orrick in San Francisco, presiding over much of the litigation, chose San Francisco school district’s case as a bellwether or test case.
- Jury selection is set to begin in Manhattan federal court for a trial over claims that British pop superstar Ed Sheeran owes a share of profits from his hit “Thinking Out Loud” for copying Marvin Gaye’s “Let’s Get It On.” Heirs of songwriter Ed Townsend sued Sheeran, his label Warner Music Group and music publisher Sony Music Publishing for allegedly ripping off Gaye’s classic, which Townsend co-wrote. The trial is the first of three Sheeran could face from lawsuits over similarities between the two hits.
- U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes in D.C. will preside over a bench trial in the DOJ’s antitrust case challenging Swedish lock maker Assa Abloy’s $4.3 billion planned deal to acquire the hardware and home improvement division from Wisconsin-based Spectrum Brands. Lawyers from Hogan Lovells and Cleary Gottlieb are defending Assa Abloy, and Davis Polk represents Spectrum.
- U.S. District Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil will hold a status conference in former Trump fundraiser Elliott Broidy’s push for sanctions against a Gibson Dunn partner he alleges has a conflict of interest in representing his adversary in a lawsuit over an alleged hack by Qatar. Gibson Dunn last August withdrew from the defense of former CIA officer Kevin Chalker and his company Global Risk Advisors. Broidy had accused Gibson Dunn partner Zainab Ahmad, who was working on Chalker’s defense, of having a conflict because she investigated the alleged hacking while working for Special Counsel Robert Mueller. Ahmad has denied she had a conflict of interest.
Court calendars are subject to last-minute docket changes.
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On Tuesday, a trial is scheduled to begin in one of former Elle magazine advice columnist E. Jean Carroll’s two lawsuits against Trump over his denials that he raped her in the mid-1990s. Trump may owe damages if Carroll convinces a Manhattan federal jury it was more likely than not that he defamed her in an October 2022 post on his Truth Social platform. Carroll has said Trump raped her at the Bergdorf Goodman department store in midtown Manhattan in late 1995 or early 1996. Trump has denied all wrongdoing.
- On Wednesday, Harvard University professor Charles Lieber is due to be sentenced after his conviction on charges that he lied about his ties to a China-run recruitment program in a case stemming from a crackdown on Chinese influence within U.S. research. In 2021, a Boston federal jury found Lieber, a nanoscientist and former chairman of Harvard’s chemistry department, guilty of making false statements to authorities, filing false tax returns and failing to report a Chinese bank account.
- On Thursday, Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes is expected to begin her prison sentence at a federal facility in Bryan, Texas. Holmes, who was sentenced to 11 years and three months after she was convicted of defrauding investors in the blood testing startup, lost her bid to remain free on bail while she appeals her conviction.
- On Friday, U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema in Alexandria, Virginia, federal court will weigh Google’s bid to dismiss the DOJ’s antitrust complaint alleging abuses in the digital advertising market. The government, which filed the ad tech lawsuit in January along with a group of states, has argued that Google should be forced to sell its ad manager suite. Google, represented by Eric Mahr of Freshfields, has denied any wrongdoing. The case is on a fast-track schedule that could see a trial early next year.
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- Bed Bath & Beyond, represented by Kirkland, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in U.S. court in New Jersey, after the home goods retailer failed to secure funds to stay afloat. The company, which has begun a liquidation sale, listed both its estimated assets and liabilities in the range of $1 billion to $10 billion. (Reuters)
- Several lawsuits have been filed over the terms of last month’s emergency deal to save Swiss lender Credit Suisse by selling it to its bigger rival UBS. Law firms such as Quinn Emanuel, Pallas Partners and Korein Tillery are among those who have spoken to prospective bondholder clients about bringing claims. (Reuters)
- Ford Motor defeated an appeal by consumers who said the automaker cheated on fuel economy tests for its F-150 and Ranger trucks, allowing it to inflate mileage estimates on window stickers. In a 3-0 decision, the 6th Circuit said federal law gave the EPA authority to estimate vehicle fuel economy, preempting the plaintiffs’ state law-based claims. Ford welcomed the ruling, while plaintiffs’ counsel Steve Berman of Hagens Berman said it was “dead against Supreme Court precedent that gives states the right to regulate deceptive conduct.” (Reuters)
- Computer-memory company Netlist won a $303 million jury award in Texas for Samsung Electronics’ infringement of several patents related to improvements in data processing. The jury determined after a six-day trial that Samsung’s “memory modules” for high-performance computing willfully infringed all five patents that Netlist accused the Korean tech giant of violating. Samsung had argued that the patents were invalid and that its technology worked in a different way than Netlist’s inventions. (Reuters)
- Former Peruvian President Alejandro Toledo failed to block his extradition to Peru over corruption charges was denied. Toledo, who was president from 2001 to 2006, is wanted in Peru over charges that he received more than $25 million from Brazilian construction company Odebrecht in exchange for help in obtaining public works contracts. (Reuters)
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