Welcome to the website of the Digital Media Law Project. The DMLP was a project of the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society from 2007 to 2014. Due to popular demand the Berkman Klein Center is keeping the website online, but please note that the website and its contents are no longer being updated. Please check any information you find here for accuracy and completeness.
This is a well-known story to DMLP readers, but it bears repeating
today. On October 1, 2007, a lawyer named Simon Glik saw members of the
Boston Police arresting a suspect on the Boston Common in a way that he
thought was excessive, and began recording the police from several feet
away. The police didn't notice him at first, but eventually approached
him and asked him if his phone was recording audio along with the
video.
In December 2011, hacktivist collective Anonymous (in)famously hacked intelligence analysis firm Stratfor Global Intelligence, collecting over 2.7 million emails, including data for over 50,000 credit card numbers, 80,000 email addresses, and more.
A new bill proposed by Florida legislator Carl Zimmermann seeks to end “mugshot websites,” a relatively new industry that exploits the marriage of the internet and open records laws in order to make a profit.
Like so many around the greater Berkman community I was stunned and saddened to hear that Aaron Swartz committed suicide late last week. I truly admired Aaron's work and consider the future of Internet policy substantially worse off without his presence. For more on his life and work, I'd encourage you to visit this gathering of Berkman blog feeds, which this week is filled with posts that discuss his life and work in greater detail.
Cell phones allow us not only to communicate with one another, but also to take and store pictures, “check in” from a location, balance our checking account, and even update our blogs. When the content of a cell phone may help the police to solve a crime, the legality of the search of both the phone and its content is of crucial importance. However, the law of warrantless searches of cell phones is not yet settled.
When hearing the expression “lèse majesté,” images of the Queen of Hearts ordering heads to be chopped off ASAP may come to mind. Marie-Antoinette, the queen who was once a “majesté” in France, herself lost her head during the French Revolution. Surely, the crime of lèse majesté is now a thing of the past?
The trafficking of children for sex in the United States is an appalling and very real problem, which a new Washington state law means to eliminate by targeting websites that offer classified advertising for escort services. But many fear the law poses a serious threat to free speech on the Internet by imposing upon online service providers
the burdensome duty to monitor, vet, and otherwise censor third-party
content.
The DMLP recently appeared as an amicus curiae in Commonwealth v. Busa, a case brought in Boston Municipal Court under Massachusetts's anti-counterfeiting law, M.G.L. ch. 266 § 147 ("Section 147").
We are looking for contributing authors with expertise in media law, intellectual property, First Amendment, and other related fields to join us as guest bloggers. If you are interested, please contact us for more details.
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