Internet Archive Finally Sued; Plenty Of Questions Raised
from the been-waiting-for-that-one... dept
Exactly one year ago, today, we wrote about a lawsuit where the lawyers on one side used the Internet Archive to find certain web pages that could be seen as incriminating evidence in the case. The lawyers on the other side were none too pleased, obviously, and accused the other lawyers of "hacking" into the Internet Archive. The company is now suing the Internet Archive and the lawyers, saying they had a robots.txt file blocking those pages, and the Archive ignored it. There are a ton of interesting legal questions raised by this lawsuit -- covering the DMCA, the Computer Fraud & Abuse Act, and plenty of other questions concerning property and copyright. Looking at the specific claims in the case, it looks like the case is unlikely to go very far. However, these questions are unlikely to go away, so this case is definitely going to be one to watch as a precursor to others that are likely to follow.
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
