USLegal Reporter

US District Judge Audrey Collins awarded the online social networking site, MySpace, a judgment of approximately $230 million on Monday against Sanford Wallace and Walter Rines for violating state anti-phishing and federal anti-spam law (CAN-SPAM), resulting in possibly the biggest historical anti-spam award.

Wallace is known for his involvement in past phishing and spyware litigation. He and Rines were not present for the court hearing regarding allegations that they committed phishing scams on MySpace.com in order to obtain passwords and then sent hundreds of thousands of email messages to members prompting them to go to other sites where Wallace and Rines made money from sales and hits. Violaters of the federal law are liable for $100 in damages per violation, which can be tripled if the violations were committed willfully and knowingly. MySpace claimed that the violations resulted in costs to the company, complaints from its members and potentially caused harm to minors from adult sites referred to in the emails.

Source: http://www.lexisone.com/news/ap/ap051408b.html

Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley announced Thursday that the social networking site Facebook will implement new restrictions to prohibit misuse of the site by child predators. Negotiations for the agreement between 49 Attorneys General and Facebook was led by Massachusetts and several other states and follows a similar one with MySpace entered into in January. Texas is the only state that has not entered agreements with Facebook or MySpace.

As part of the agreement, Facebook plans to impose 40 safeguards, including establishing a hotline for law enforcement inquiries, preventing users from altering their ages and blocking mechanisms that would prevent access to minors’ profiles. Facebook will also heighten its monitoring of website content, including that of contact information and inappropriate material.

Source: http://www6.lexisnexis.com/publisher/EndUser?Action=UserDisplayFullDocument&orgId=607&docId=l:l:788886963&topicId=12708&source=undefined&start=13&topics=single

The US House of Representatives today approved legislation which requires more judicial supervision over electronic surveillance. The bill does not include telecom immunity which had been demanded by President Bush. Bush had hoped the measure would give telecommunications companies retroactive immunity for cooperating with the government in the past on warrantless wiretappings.

Telecommunications companies presently face more than 40 lawsuits which allege they have breached customers’ privacy rights.  

Also key in the legislation is that it now restores the power of the federal courts to approve wiretapping warrants. It also authorizes federal inspectors to investigate the administration’s warrantless surveillance efforts.

Source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/14/AR2008031400803.html?hpid=topnews

The U.S. House of Representatives Tuesday issued a proposal statement in an effort to compromise differences between the House, Senate and Bush Administration regarding the inclusion of legal immunity for telecommunication companies who participated in warrantless government surveillance in legislation designed to update the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

The proposal does not offer retroactive immunity from legal prosecution for such companies, but allows the companies to privately present evidence without the plaintiffs of the approximately 40 pending lawsuits being present. This private review is intended to satisfy the administration’s concern that the companies cannot adequately defend themselves in the lawsuits without the disclosure of classified information that might threaten the nation’s safety.

The administration issued a responding statement expressing its concern over the proposal and reiterating its position that full immunity should be included in the legislation. The House will likely vote on the proposed legislation soon.

Source: http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/paperchase/2008/03/us-house-leaders-propose-compromise-on.php

The Federal Bureau of Investigations today confirmed that it improperly accessed the private information of Americans while attempting to investigate and track terrorist and spies. The FBI said telephone records, credit reports, and Internet traffic of individuals were improperly reviewed in 2006.

The FBI has since implemented new reforms to prevent such abuses.

FBI officials testified before a Senate Judiciary Committee today. The committee is reviewing provisions of the Patriot Act which allow the issuance of national security letters. These letters enable the FBI to obtain private information without first seeking authority from a judge or grand jury.

Source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/05/AR2008030500463.html

The U.S. Senate voted Tuesday to pass the FISA Amendments Act, a bill that would offer legal immunity to telecommunication companies that participated in the government warrantless eavesdropping program after 9/11. The vote came shortly before expiration of the temporary Protect America Act on February 15.

Congress has been debating for some time now new surveillance legislation to update the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, while the Bush Administration has threatened to veto any bill not containing full liability protection for telecommunication companies. The version of the bill before the House of Representatives still does not allow for such immunity.

The Senate also voted Tuesday to give more authority to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court over government surveillance of Americans and to require a court order for surveillance of Americans who are located overseas.

Source: http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/paperchase/2008/02/us-senate-passes-surveillance-bill-with.php

The U.S. House of Representatives agreed Tuesday on a two-week extension for the Protect America Act of 2007, which would otherwise have expired February 1, 2008.

The extension, seen as a compromise between Democrats and Republicans, will give the Senate more time to pass new surveillance legislation to update the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The Bush Administration has threatened to veto any legislation that does not include immunity for past surveillance participation by telecommunications companies.

Source: http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/paperchase/2008/01/us-house-votes-to-extend-surveillance.php

The U.S. Senate rejected a bill Thursday that would have amended the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Bill to increase oversight by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of government eavesdropping of Americans. The Senate Judiciary Committee previously approved the legislation to update the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

The current law, the Protect America Act, which temporarily allows government eavesdropping inside the U.S. without prior court approval when one person to the communication is believed to be located outside the U.S., expires on February 1, 2008. The Bush Administration supports legislation to extend the government’s surveillance authority and grant legal immunity to telecommunication companies who participated in the terrorist surveillance program.

Source: http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/paperchase/2008/01/senate-rejects-surveillance-legislation.php

Popular social networking site, My Space.com, today reached a deal with attorney generals from 49 states to take better measures to improve child online safety. Among the new measures, MySpace.com says it will improve age and identity verification, block children under 14 from accessing the site, and establish a 24 hours hotline for law enforcement officials.

The steps are an attempt to reduce the potential of children falling victim to online predators. MpSpace has been criticized for failing to block child sexual offenders from its site and has since cooperated with authorities in ongoing investigations. MySpace has also joined an industry task force to continue to improve online safety measures.

Source: http://www.informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=205604574

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security issued final regulations Friday for the REAL ID Act, legislation which was passed in 2005 as an effort to decrease driver’s license or other government identification fraud by terrorists and illegal immigrants.

As a result of much opposition from civil liberties organizations with privacy concerns and 17 states that have enacted laws or resolutions objecting to the Act’s costs, implementation of the Act has been extended from its original date in 2008 to a phase-by-phase implementation to be completed between 2011 and 2017. States will be required to seek a waiver for more time to comply with the law if the state wants its residents’ current driver’s licenses to remain valid for air travel after May 2008. If a state fails to seek a waiver, its residents will be required to use a passport or a new federal passport document to avoid secondary security screenings. All states must begin checking social security numbers and immigration status of driver’s license or identification card applicants over the next year. Ultimately, states will be required to check with the State Department for verification of applicants who use passports to obtain driver’s licenses, to verify birth certificates and to communicate with other states to ensure applicants do not have multiple licenses.

Homeland Security has decreased state implementation costs of the Act from $14.6 billion to $3.9 billion and claims that although the new identity cards will have security measures, they will not contain microchips. The new rules also allow a limited exemption for persons over 50 years of age: such persons will be exempt from the requirement that by 2014, persons must show a REAL ID driver’s license or identification card in order to board an airplane or enter a federal building. The regulations provide states with more time to comply with the Act by not imposing these requirements on persons 50 years of age or older until 2017.

Source: http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/paperchase/2008/01/homeland-security-issues-real-id-act.php; http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080111/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/secure_driver_s_licenses