Tim Cushing
Tech Dirt
June 13, 2019
Former revenge porn extortionist and current pro se litigant, Craig Brittain, is one severely-narrowed complaint away from having his lawsuit against Twitter tossed. Brittain sued Twitter over the deletion of several accounts, including those he had whipped up for his Senate run.
The court’s first pass at the lawsuit moved it to California, a venue shift Brittain explicitly agreed to each time he created another alt account. Terms of service say suing Twitter means suing in California, even if you’re an Arizonan Senate hopeful with a closet that contains nothing but skeletons.
Contrary to Brittain’s fervent and litigious belief, there’s nothing illegal about deleting Craig Brittain’s multiple Twitter accounts. Brittain’s lawsuit tried to make it possible by treating Twitter as both a provider and a publisher, depending of which description worked out better for his arguments. The court decides to let Brittain have it both ways — and lose both ways. (h/t Adam Steinbaugh)
As a service provider, Twitter cannot be held liable for third party content. It can also remove accounts without losing this immunity. Since this isn’t about the removal of content, but rather the removal of accounts, Brittain tried to argue Section 230 immunity can’t protect Twitter from this lawsuit because removing accounts (and their content) is an editorial activity. The court points out this has zero effect on Section 230 protections. From the decision [PDF]:
In the beginning of 2017, Twitter said it would take on harassment and hate speech. CEO Jack Dorsey said the company would embrace a “completely new approach to abuse on Twitter” with open dialogue along the way.
For months, though, the company has offered few details about what it would do, or when. That changed late yesterday, when Twitter posted a timeline with specific promises on actions it will take.
The changes begin next week. On October 27, Twitter will expand what types of “non-consensual nudity” (aka “revenge porn”) that it takes action against. The company will already act when a victim complains, but Twitter will soon act even in cases where the victims may not be aware images were taken, instances like upskirt photos and hidden webcams. “Anyone we identify as the original poster of non-consensual nudity will be suspended immediately,” the October entry reads.
Without My Consent, a San Francisco-based advocacy organization that aims to help victims of revenge porn, has released a slew of new resources this week in an attempt to make seeking justice easier for victims.
The new materials, dubbed “Something Can Be Done! Guide,” provides a step-by-step guide for victims. It provides concrete measures that they can take, including evidence preservation, copyright registration, restraining orders, and takedown requests to Internet companies—many of which don’t require the often-costly services of a lawyer. (Without My Consent’s efforts are reminiscent of Nolo, a decades-old do-it-yourself legal publisher.)
A man handed six years for threatening a local Georgia court clerk that he would post a sex tape of her on Facebook had his conviction overturned by the state’s Supreme Court. The justices ruled Monday that the Facebook postings did not constitute criminality or a “true threat” under the law, because the defendant did not express an “intent to commit an act of unlawful violence.”
Google announced Friday that it would remove search results pointing to revenge porn, a switch of sorts for the search giant that generally is loath to remove search results.
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Kevin Bollaert, the 28-year-old convicted of operating the “revenge porn” website UGotPosted.com, was sentenced on Friday to 18 years behind bars.
Bollaert, of San Diego, was also convicted in February on several counts of identity theft and extortion. His website allowed people to submit nude photos of their ex-partners—mainly women—accompanied by the victim’s name, age, and a Facebook profile link.
The photos were uploaded without the consent of the victims, and those who wanted their photos and information removed from the site were charged up to $350. Bollaert apparently made thousands of dollars from the website. Many of the victims received harassing messages online as a result of their photos and personal information being posted on the site.
On Monday afternoon, a San Diego judge ruled in a pretrial hearing that the state of California has enough evidence to proceed with its case against Kevin Bollaert, the alleged operator of the “revenge porn” site ugotposted.com.
Bollaert, 27, was arrested in December of last year and was charged with 31 felony counts of identity theft, extortion, and conspiracy for running a site that asked users to upload nude photos of victims along with their full name, age, location, and a Facebook link. Investigators said that when victims would ask Bollaert to take the pictures down, he would direct them to a separate website that he created, changemyreputation.com, where they would be asked to pay a fee, usually between $300 and $350. Bollaert himself said he made about $900 a month on advertising revenue from the site. The California government alleges he made more than $10,000 off of ugotposted.
Sites like Bollaert’s often believe they are protected by Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which prevents operators of websites from being held responsible for the content posted by their users. Bollaert pleaded not guilty at his arraignment in January.
Houston woman Meryem Ali has filed a $123-million lawsuit against both Facebook and a former friend who posted a picture of her on an “imposter” Facebook profile under her name, according to Texas Lawyer.
Photographs “that depict the true face of plaintiff” were altered with Photoshop and “attached to false, phony, naked body shots, and at least one pose where there is plaintiff in a graphic pornographic-like photo,” states the complaint, which was filed on July 25 in Harris County.
“These phony photos falsely and maliciously depicted plaintiff in a clearly derogatory and false light … as some overly bold and overly aggressive sexual person, which plaintiff in fact and truth is not,” writes Ali’s lawyer.
On Monday, Noe Iniguez, 36, was sentenced to a year of jail time for three criminal counts, including one count of violating California’s relatively new revenge porn law. Iniguez was also found guilty of twice violating a restraining order his ex-girlfriend had against him.
In a press release, the Los Angeles City Attorney’s Office said that the conviction of Iniguez under the revenge porn law was its first. A jury ruled that Iniguez will also have to serve 36 months probation, attend domestic violence counseling, and stay away from the victim.
California’s revenge porn law was enacted in October 2013, and it forbids people from posting “nude or sexual” photos online with the intent to cause emotional harm. Violators of the law can face six months in jail and a $1,000 fine. The state aimed to go after popular sites like Hunter Moore’s IsAnybodyUp, which posted nude photos of people with their identifying information but without their consent. Such sites have usually demanded a fee to have the photos taken down.
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