Given all of the flack about the operator's of this bulletin board being sued/subpoenaed or otherwise involved in legal hassles, take a look at this: http://www.msnbc.com/news/401951.asp The Supreme Court has ruled that ISPs and Bullentin Board providers have no financial liability for defamatory postings or e-mails that occur using their service.
RE: Case Closed This is a most DEFINATE ruling and one in which I'm quite thankful for as at least for now we still maintain free speech in this country (or at least on the internet). Guess we all know what Christine can do with her threats to Credinet.com now. How about you J. Edgar this topic is right up your alley.
RE: Case Closed I think this was pretty much a slam-dunk. The telecommunications reform act of 1996 (which also contained the CDA) extended the same immunity to ISPs and other 'digital age' communications providers such as Bulletin Board operators that had been enjoyed by the telephone company and the post office for many, many years. If someone phones in a bomb threat, the telephone company is not legally liable. If someone mails you death threats the post office is not legally liable. They are just the communications medium, not the 'publisher' of the message. To hold them otherwise accountable would mean that the phone company would have to monitor the content of every telephone call made and the post office would have to open and read every piece of mail. Certainly this is impractical at best and I don't think people would stand for that kind of invasion of privacy.
RE: Case Closed Steven Z and J. Edgar what would you care to bet that the Supreme Court was wrong and Queen Christine is right. I mean after all she is never wrong, if you don't believe me just ask the Queen herself.
RE: Case Closed that's not quite true / bad example... if you are getting phone calls that harrass or threaten tou the phone company WILL put a "trap" and supply you with the information to take to the authorities along with proof that the calls were made
RE: Case Closed You are correct, they will assist you and law enforcement authorities in attempting to track down the culprit and provide evidence of illegal, etc... However you missed the point of the case. You can not turn around and sue the telephone company because you have received harrassing and threatening telephone calls. Law enforcement authorities may not press charges against the telephone company because someone used telephone company facilities to aid, abet, and/or commit a crime. As a communications provider, the telephone company is not legally liable (civilly or criminally) for the content of the communication transmitted through their facilities.
The Prodigy case has absolutely NOTHING to do with this miserable situation here. Prodigy was never aware of a problem until the police investigaion. Then Prodigy CLOSED the users account and fully cooperated without a court order. I never said that creditnet.com was responsible for the postings they don't know about. I had asked for their server time zone and for copies of the defamatory postings about me when they deleted them, as I needed them for the Sheriff Department. I'm still awaiting a response from creditnet.com. I haven't received a single posting from creditnet.com. I obviously know what their CURRENT time zone is. And since "Robert" continued to post here about me, that's sufficient. Again, Prodigy DID close the abusers account and fully cooperated. Unlike creditnet.com and mindspring.com.
RE: Case Closed The phone company WOULD be liable if they refused to provide assistance. What State do YOU live in?
RE: Case Closed No they would not be criminally nor civilly liable. They would be in trouble with the Public Utilities Commission though. Utility Commission regulation require the telephone company to cooperate (to some extent) with criminal investigations and to produce records in response to a subpoena for a civil action. ISPs, etc are not regulated by the Utilities commission as there is sufficient competition to keep them in check. The Communication Act of 1934 and the Telecommunications Reform Act of 1996 gives 'common carriers' qualified immunity from civil lawsuits and criminal liability for their facilities being used to commit a crime or used to commit some actionable tort. These are federal laws. ISPs, Bulletin Board Operators, and Web Hosting companies are considered 'common carriers' and are not expected to monitor the content of all communications carried through their medium. For the record, I live in Boston.
RE: Case Closed So, in Boston I can get threatening phone calls, and when the phone company refuses to assist, I can't even sue?
It's unfortunate the Comm Act of 1996 doesn't cover annoying whiners on public BBS/web boards....Christine, you're bent all out of shape over an idiot putz who likes to use potty mouth language...let it go...he has nothing..he's a loser..and he's laughing at yoy...suing him, or anyone else, will only cost you more hassle and dollars than it is worth.. And yes, you have become extremely annoying to those of us who read this board... Move on...
J. Edgar, I still don't think she fully gets it. Creditnet, Mindspring, and whoever on the net do not have to supply you with any information without a court order, you get a court order and by law they will have to give it to you. But by law they do not have to furnish you "the public" with any information you want just because you want it. I really don't think you want myself or anyone else knowing your IP without your say so. Christine it's like you had an unlisted phone #, without a court order the phone co. will not give you the information. Other wise when you call everyone names as you have in the past, would you want everyone to know your address, I would think not, it would take you weeks to answer everyone if they did. Your biggest problem is you demand eveything, you don't ask politely, you demand!! Just because you demand info for the police, does not grant creditnet the authority to give it to you, if that were the case, we could all demand your address just about everytime you respond. Your hateful, mean spirited, and down right rude to everyone, and that's the reason we treat you the same way.
J. Edgar, I still don't think she fully gets it. Creditnet, Mindspring, and whoever on the net do not have to supply you with any information without a court order, you get a court order and by law they will have to give it to you. But by law they do not have to furnish you "the public" with any information you want just because you want it. I really don't think you want myself or anyone else knowing your addy without your say so. Christine it's like you had an unlisted phone #, without a court order the phone co. will not give you the information. Other wise when you call everyone names as you have in the past, would you want everyone to know your address, I would think not, it would take you weeks to answer everyone if they did. Your biggest problem is you demand eveything, you don't ask politely, you demand!! Just because you demand info for the police, does not grant creditnet the authority to give it to you, if that were the case, we could all demand your address just about everytime you respond. Your hateful, mean spirited, and down right rude to everyone, and that's the reason we treat you the same way.
RE: Case Closed Well, you can sue them, but you won't win. You are missing the point though. Communications providers have qualified immunity regarding the contents of the communication that are carried through their facilities. You can not sue them because someone used their facilities to commit an actionable tort upon you. Whether they choose to cooperate or not is of no consequence in the finding of fact regarding a lawsuit. You can compel them to produce whatever records or other information they have with a subpoena if you have brought a lawsuit against an individual who used their facilities to commit a tort against you, but if you sue them for damages as a result of someone simply using their facilities to do so, the suit will be dismissed.
One more thing... I'm just trying to convey what the position of the law is on the matter at hand, which is the liability of a common carrier in the case of it being used to harrass, annoy, beguile, stalk, vex, irk, irritate, or otherwise rankle someone. Clearly, it's up to the common carrier to do what they believe is correct. It's a business decision on their part.
RE: Its Over Quite a conclusive summation as far most of us are concerned that settles that. "It's a business decision on their part." You might as well as waived a red flag in front of a bull considering Christine considers Credinet.com the second comming of the union carpetbaggers and incarnation of 'evil capitalism' itself. Perhaps we should just leave her and her socialist mindset to MichaelOH he seems to enjoy baiting their kind
Yup, it's a business decision I've said that all along. They didn't want to take the 10 seconds per posting it takes to e-mail it. That's exactly my point. Thank you.
