On February 8, 2010, Jonathon Harris, a rare coin dealer, filed a lawsuit against Google, Inc. in Florida state court. According to the complaint, a Google Phonebook search for rare coins returned his home address and a map to his home, rather than information for his business address for periods of time from July 2007 through January 2010.

Arguing that he "reasonably feels that crimes of theft, burglary, and home invasion are more likely if he publishes his family's home address as a place where rare coins are found," Mr. Harris sought a permanent injunction and claimed damages from invasion of privacy and intentional infliction of emotional distress. According to the complaint, Google failed to permanently correct the entry after multiple written demands, even though Google had a written policy to remove such information upon written demand within 48 hours.

After removing the complaint to federal court, Google has moved to dismiss all claims, arguing that Mr. Harris's home address is not a private fact. Additionally, Google argued that the suit is barred by Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act because the information from the search was provided by a third party who aggregates telephone directories and other public records otherwise available on the web.

In October 2009, Donald Marvin Jones, a law professor at the University of Miami School of Law, sued David Lat and David Minkin, editor and publisher of the popular law gossip blog Above the Law (ATL), as well as ATL's parent company, Dead Horse Media. The complaint seeks $22 million in damages and an injunction "enjoining Abovethelaw to remove all articles and posts concerning Professor Jones."

The lawsuit revolves around a series of posts ATL published after Jones was arrested in 2007 on suspicion of trying to solicit sex from a prostitute. In these posts, ATL made fun of Jones—calling him "The Nutty Professor"—and posted a screenshot of the "incident report" for his arrest.  In one post, Lat published a photo/graphic mash-up collage forwarded to him by a reader that—according to the complaint—"depict[ed] Professor Jones as a drug dealer and a pimp or both."  The graphic featured one photograph of Jones superimposed on a $20 bill and another talking up a group of prostitutes. 

According to the National Law Journal, Jones pleaded not guilty to the solicitation charge, and the authorities later dismissed the charge and expunged it from Jones' record.

Jones' complaint alleges that ATL infringed his copyright by publishing the mash-up collage because a photo in it was "stolen from the UM website without permission." There is no allegation that Jones, as opposed to the University, owns the copyright in the photo or that the photo is registered with the copyright office. Jones also alleges that publication of the collage casts him in a false light by portraying him as a "dope dealer, pimp, and criminal."

Finally, the complaint alleges that ATL invaded his privacy and cast him in a false light by publishing the "incident report" despite dismissal and expungement of the solicitation charges.  Jones' claim that ATL made "private records public" is complicated by Fla. Stat. § 119.105, which provides that "[p]olice reports are public records except as otherwise made exempt or confidential," and says that, even in the case of exempt or confidential police reports, "[t]his section does not prohibit the publication of such information to the general public by any news media legally entitled to possess that information."

Sedgwick, a company that provides insurance claims management services, sued Robert Delsman, a former employee of one of Sedgwick's clients, for copyright infringement, defamation, and other torts, after he created gripe sites, blogs, videos and print materials criticizing the company. Delsman's beef with the company started after he filed a claim for disability benefits in 2006.  According to the complaint, Delsman was unhappy with the way in which Sedgwick handled his claims, and began a campaign of harassment which allegedly included:

• Hosting pictures of Sedgwick's CEO and COO on his website and blog, which "morph[ed] . . . into images of Adolph Hitler and Heinrich Himmler," and posting a similar video to YouTube
• Referring to Sedgwick and its employees as "Sedgthugs"
• Unjustly accusing Sedgwick of engaging in criminal behavior on his website and in emails
• "Operation Going Postcard," in which Delsman sent postcards to Sedgwick offices, employees, customers and outside insurance agencies in multiple states.  These postcards allegedly contained copyrighted images of Sedgwick's CEO and COO and an image of a human skull containing Sedgwick's trademark in the eye sockets, along with "defamatory, false and libelous statements against Sedgwick.

(Compl. ¶¶ 12-13.)  Sedgwick sought damages, fees, and an injunction preventing Delsman from sending offensive emails or postcards and further defaming or libeling Sedgwick, and requiring him to remove all of Sedgwick's copyrighted material from his website and blog and to destroy all Sedgwick's copyrighted material in his possession.

Delsman, who is representing himself pro se, has filed a motion for summary judgment.  The court has yet to rule on his motion.

UPDATE:

07/17/2009- The court construed Delsman's motion for summary judgment as a motion to dismiss and granted the motion.  The court held that the copyright claim failed because Delsman's use of Sedgwick photographs was fair use.  The court dismissed the remaining claims under California's anti-SLAPP statute.

12/16/2009- Sedgwick filed its opening brief on appeal.

01/29/2010 - Delsman filed its response brief.

03/01/2010 - Sedgwick filed its reply brief.

03/21/2011 - In an unpublished, two-page opinion, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the district court's ruling.

John Cafiero, a rock musician and manager of punk bands The Ramones and The Misfits, filed suit against Doug Custer (a/k/a Doug Evil) alleging in his complaint that Custer infringed his copyright by posting an animated video featuring The Misfits on YouTube.com and other websites.  Cafiero also brought a claim of misrepresentation under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, arguing that Custer lied on his DMCA counter-notification by claiming a copyright interest in the video.

Alongside the copyright allegations, Cafiero alleged defamation and false light arising from various Internet postings Custer allegedly made that criticized Cafiero.  Many of these arose from spoof site Osuka Papsmear, which Cafiero asserts is a Custer blog dedicated to defaming Cafiero and his band Osaka Popstar.

Early in the case, Cafiero received a default judgment against Custer after Custer did not appear or answer the complaint.  Appearing pro se, Custer successfully challenged the default judgment and filed his answer and counterclaims.  Custer's lengthy counterclaims, which discuss Cafiero's business dealings in depth, appear to bring claims of copyright infringement and defamation.  Custer's filings maintain that he himself authored most of the material appearing in the video and that Cafiero reneged on his promises regarding publication and use of the video.

On November 11, 2008, Cafiero filed a motion to dismiss Custer's counterclaims for failure to comply with rules of civil procedure, asking in the alternative for Custer to file a more definite statement.  Custer opposed the motion and filed a more definite statement.

On May 22, 2009, the parties agreed to submit the case to mediation proceedings, and the judge referred the case to mediation on June 1. The defendant consented to appointed counsel for the mediation process only.

On May 28, Cafiero moved to file an amended complaint that would add two more plaintiffs --  Jerry Caiafa (a/k/a Jerry Only), who composed music for the video; and Cyclopian Music, Inc., the owner of The Misfits trademarks. The motion also sought to add counts of copyright infringement arising from use of Caiafa's work; trademark infringement under  Section 32 of the Lanham Act; and false designation of origin and unfair competition under Section 43 of the Lanham Act. The defendant opposed the motion to amend the complaint, asserting that adding more plaintiffs would conflict with the purpose of mediation.

On February 25, 2009, Michael Wolff, founder of Newser, blogged that Newser had recently received a letter from the New York Times requesting that it stop using the Times' "T" logo.  Newser is a news aggregator and curator that links to and summarizes articles from news sources around the web.  The articles are presented as a grid of photographs, each overlayed with the title of the article, the amount of time since it was uploaded, and the source of the article, usually accompanied by a small logo of that source. 

Wolff has not made the letter public, but he told the Neiman Journalism Lab that it came from the New York Times Company's General Counsel's office.  Wolff told Peter Kafka, of MediaMemo, that the letter was "legal boilerplate," warning that the Times would "pursue all available remedies, both criminal and civil" if they continued to use the logo.

Catherine Mathis, a spokeswoman for the Times, told the Neiman Journalism Lab that they asked Newser to stop using the "gothic 'T' logo," which is trademarked, and asked Newser to take down a photo that was used without permission and misattributed, presumably on the basis of copyright. She also told the Neiman Journalism Lab that Newser took down the photo. The Times' logo still appears on Newser for summaries from the New York Times.  

After a dispute arose about Flora Nicolazzo's failure to make payments to Dennis Yoingco for the sale of a bulldog, Yoingco allegedly posted "websites and other internet messages and postings defaming [Flora and Robert Nicolazzo], including a copy of her driver's license and a mock wanted poster later edited to say 'Captured.'"  The Nicolazzos filed a lawsuit in Ohio State Court, claiming defamation, false light invasion of privacy, abuse of process, telecommunications and telephone harassment, and intentional infliction of emotional distress.  

Yoingco filed a motion to dismiss, and the court denied the motion with regard to each of the Nicolazzo's claims, except the claims for telecommunications and telephone harassment, which the court dismissed.  See Nicolazzo v. Yoingco, 898 N.E.2d 94 (Ohio Ct. Cm. Pls. 2007). The case went to trial in November 2007, and the jury returned a judgment in favor of Yoingco. 

In late October 2008, Colorado authorities charged Robert Ezekiel Tafoya with one count of criminal libel.  According to the Pueblo Chieftan: 

"The investigation showed that the defendant pasted pictures of the face of one person onto the body of other persons and published or disseminated the pictures electronically to others," Thiebaut [the District Attorney] said. "We believe it impeached the reputation (of his accuser) and those pictures were being used to ridicule her." Thiebaut would not elaborate on the relationship between Tafoya and his accuser, or what the doctored photos depicted, except to say that they cast Tafoya's accuser "in a compromising position."