lawsuit

ai-startup-sues-ex-ceo,-saying-he-took-41gb-of-email-and-lied-on-resume

AI startup sues ex-CEO, saying he took 41GB of email and lied on résumé

AI, lawsuit, Litigation, Policy, startups / Rejus Almole / March 7, 2026

Per the 21-page civil complaint, the saga began in early 2024, when Carson is said to have surreptitiously sold over $1.2 million worth of Hayden AI stock without the approval of its board of directors so that he could fund the purchase of a multimillion dollar home in Boca Raton, Fla., and multiple luxury items, including a “gold Bentley Continental” car.

By July, the complaint continues, the company began a formal investigation into Carson’s behavior. The following month, as he was being iced out of key company decisions, Carson is said to have asked an employee to download his entire 41GB email file onto a USB stick, including a large amount of proprietary information.

Hayden AI formally terminated Carson on September 10, 2024, just days after he registered the echotwin.ai domain name.

Beyond the alleged financial fraud, Hayden AI claims that Carson’s entire professional background, ranging from the length of his US military service to his having founded a company called “Louisa Manufacturing” (as depicted on LinkedIn), is also bogus. The complaint calls Carson’s CV a “carefully constructed fraud.”

According to Carson’s LinkedIn profile, he completed a doctorate from Waseda University in Tokyo in 2007.

“That is a lie,” the complaint states. “Carson does not hold a PhD from Waseda or any other university. In 2007, he was not obtaining a PhD but was operating ‘Splat Action Sports,’ a paintball equipment business in a Florida strip mall.”

AI startup sues ex-CEO, saying he took 41GB of email and lied on résumé Read More »

Workers report watching Ray-Ban Meta-shot footage of people using the bathroom

AI, AI privacy, lawsuit, Meta, Policy, privacy, ray-ban, smart glasses, Tech / Paul Patrick / March 5, 2026

Meta accused of “concealing the facts” about smart glass users’ privacy.

A marketing image for Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses. Credit: Meta

Meta’s approach to user privacy is under renewed scrutiny following a Swedish report that employees of a Meta subcontractor have watched footage captured by Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses showing sensitive user content.

The workers reportedly work for Kenya-headquartered Sama and provide data annotation for Ray-Ban Metas.

The February report, a collaboration from Swedish newspapers Svenska Dagbladet, Göteborgs-Posten, and Kenya-based freelance journalist Naipanoi Lepapa, is, per a machine translation, based on interviews with over 30 employees at various levels of Sama, including several people who work with video, image, and speech annotation for Meta’s AI systems. Some of the people interviewed have worked on projects other than Meta’s smart glasses. The report’s authors said they did not gain access to the materials that Sama workers handle or the area where workers perform data annotation. The report is also based on interviews with former US Meta employees who have reportedly witnessed live data annotation for several Meta projects.

The report pointed to, per the translation, a “stream of privacy-sensitive data that is fed straight into the tech giant’s systems,” and that makes Sama workers uncomfortable. The authors said that several people interviewed for the report said they have seen footage shot with Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses that shows people having sex and using the bathroom.

“I saw a video where a man puts the glasses on the bedside table and leaves the room. Shortly afterwards, his wife comes in and changes her clothes,” an anonymous Sama employee reportedly said, per the machine translation.

Another anonymous employee said that they have seen users’ partners come out of the bathroom naked.

“You understand that it is someone’s private life you are looking at, but at the same time you are just expected to carry out the work,” an anonymous Sama employee reportedly said.

Meta confirms use of data annotators

In statements shared with the BBC on Wednesday, Meta confirmed that it “sometimes” shares content that users share with the Meta AI generative AI chatbot with contractors to review with “the purpose of improving people’s experience, as many other companies do.”

“This data is first filtered to protect people’s privacy,” the statement said, pointing to, as an example, blurring out faces in images.

Meta’s privacy policy for wearables says that photos and videos taken with its smart glasses are sent to Meta “when you turn on cloud processing on your AI Glasses, interact with the Meta AI service on your AI Glasses, or upload your media to certain services provided by Meta (i.e., Facebook or Instagram). You can change your choices about cloud processing of your Media at any time in Settings.”

The policy also says that video and audio from livestreams recorded with Ray-Ban Metas are sent to Meta, as are text transcripts and voice recordings created by Meta’s chatbot.

“We use machine learning and trained reviewers to process this data to improve, troubleshoot, and train our products. We share that information with third-party vendors and service providers to improve our products. You can access and delete recordings and related transcripts in the Meta AI App,” the policy says.

Meta’s broader privacy policy for the Meta AI chatbot adds: “In some cases, Meta will review your interactions with AIs, including the content of your conversations with or messages to AIs, and this review may be automated or manual (human).”

That policy also warns users against sharing “information that you don’t want the AIs to use and retain, such as information about sensitive topics.”

“When information is shared with AIs, the AIs will sometimes retain and use that information,” the Meta AI privacy policy says.

Notably, in August, Meta made “Meta AI with camera” on by default until a user turns off support for the “Hey Meta” voice command, per an email sent to users at the time. Meta spokesperson Albert Aydin told The Verge at the time that “photos and videos captured on Ray-Ban Meta are on your phone’s camera roll and not used by Meta for training.”

However, some Ray-Ban Meta users may not have read or understood the numerous privacy policies associated with Meta’s smart glasses.

Sama employees suggested that Ray-Ban Meta owners may be unaware that the devices are sometimes recording. Employees reportedly pointed to users recording their bank card or porn that they’re watching, seemingly inadvertently.

Meta’s smart glasses flash a red light when they are recording video or taking a photo, but there has been criticism that people may not notice the light or misinterpret its meaning.

“We see everything, from living rooms to naked bodies. Meta has that type of content in its databases. People can record themselves in the wrong way and not even know what they are recording,” an anonymous employee was quoted as saying.

When reached for comment by Ars Technica, a Sama representative shared a statement saying that Sama doesn’t “comment on specific client relationships or projects” but is GDPR and CCPA-compliant and uses “rigorously audited policies and procedures designed to protect all customer information, including personally identifiable information.”

Saama’s statement added:

This work is conducted in secure, access-controlled facilities. Personal devices are not permitted on production floors, and all team members undergo background checks and receive ongoing training in data protection, confidentiality, and responsible AI practices. Our teams receive living wages and full benefits, and have access to comprehensive wellness resources and on-site support.

Meta sued

The Swedish report has reignited concerns about the privacy of Meta’s smart glasses, including from the Information Commissioner’s Office, a UK data watchdog that has written to Meta about the report. The debate also comes as Meta is reportedly planning to add facial recognition to its Ray-Ban and Oakley-branded smart glasses “as soon as this year,” per a February report from The New York Times citing anonymous people “involved with the plans.”

The claims have also led to a proposed class-action lawsuit [PDF] filed yesterday against Meta and Luxottica of America, a subsidiary of Ray-Ban parent company EssilorLuxottica. The lawsuit challenges Meta’s slogan for the glasses, “designed for privacy, controlled by you,” saying:

No reasonable consumer would understand “designed for privacy, controlled by you” and similar promises like “built for your privacy” to mean that deeply personal footage from inside their homes would be viewed and catalogued by human workers overseas. Meta chose to make privacy the centerpiece of its pervasive marketing campaign while concealing the facts that reveal those promises to be false.

The lawsuit alleges that Meta has broken state consumer protection laws and seeks damages, punitive penalties, and an injunction requiring Meta to change business practices “to prevent or mitigate the risk of the consumer deception and violations of law.”

Ars Technica reached out to Meta for comment but didn’t hear back before publication. Meta has declined to comment on the lawsuit to other outlets.

Scharon is a Senior Technology Reporter at Ars Technica writing news, reviews, and analysis on consumer gadgets and services. She’s been reporting on technology for over 10 years, with bylines at Tom’s Hardware, Channelnomics, and CRN UK.

Workers report watching Ray-Ban Meta-shot footage of people using the bathroom Read More »

RFK Jr.’s anti-vaccine policies are “unreviewable,” DOJ lawyer tells judge

aap, anti-vaccine, health, lawsuit, lawyer, robert f kennedy jr, vaccine / Paul Patrick / March 5, 2026

US Department of Justice lawyer Isaac Belfer argued that Kennedy has the broad authority to make all of the changes he has already made and more. He claimed that the AAP and other medical groups were asking the court to “supervise vaccine policy indefinitely.”

US District Judge Brian Murphy overseeing the case in Boston appeared skeptical of the suggestion that Kennedy has seemingly limitless authority over federal vaccine policy.

“Is it your position that [Kennedy] is totally unreviewable?” Murphy asked Belfer, according to Reuters. “If the secretary said instead of getting a shot to prevent measles I think you should get a shot that gives you measles, is that unreviewable?”

“Yes,” Belfer replied.

Belfer, arguing on behalf of the Department of Health and Human Services, said the medical organizations were merely seeking to use the courts to enact their favored vaccine policy. But the lawyer for the groups, James Oh, countered that the vaccine policy changes—which were not carried out with typical processes and lack supporting scientific evidence—were done improperly and without reasoned decision-making.

Kennedy’s vaccine policy changes are the “actions of someone who believes he can do whatever he wants,” Oh said, according to Stat News.

Murphy indicated he would issue a ruling on the injunction before the CDC vaccine advisors plan to meet on March 18, calling it a “hard deadline.”

RFK Jr.’s anti-vaccine policies are “unreviewable,” DOJ lawyer tells judge Read More »

New York sues Valve for enabling “illegal gambling” with loot boxes

Counter-Strike, gambling, gaming, lawsuit, loot box, new york, Policy, valve / Paul Patrick / February 26, 2026

Opening a valuable skin like this in a loot box is akin to winning a lottery, New York alleges in a new lawsuit. Credit: Twitter / Luksusbums

The lawsuit also takes Valve to task for allowing third-party sites that facilitate the resale of in-game skins for cash. While the suit notes that Valve has “sporadically enforced” rules against so-called skin gambling sites—which use Steam inventories as virtual chips for gambling games—it alleges that Valve “has not acted against sites that permit the sale of Valve’s virtual items.” The suit cites “internal communications” from numerous Valve employees suggesting that the company was OK with such “cash-out services” for Steam items as long as off-platform gambling wasn’t explicitly involved.

We’ll see you in court

In a press release announcing the suit, state Attorney General Letitia James said the gambling Valve’s system enables can “lead to serious addiction problems, especially for our young people. … These features are addictive, harmful, and illegal, and my office is suing to stop Valve’s illegal conduct and protect New Yorkers.”

In 2016, Valve faced a pair of civil lawsuits from parents concerned about Valve’s connection to skin gambling sites—those suits were eventually dismissed. Around the same time, Valve received a letter from Washington state threatening “civil or criminal action” if Valve didn’t crack down on skin gambling, but the state stopped short of filing a lawsuit in that matter.

In addition to asking Valve to modify or eliminate its loot box system, the New York suit asks for Valve to make “full restitution to consumers” for the disgorgement of “all monies” received from its gambling system, and for fines of “three times the amount of its gain.” Ars Technica has reached out to Valve for comment.

New York sues Valve for enabling “illegal gambling” with loot boxes Read More »

Lawsuit: ChatGPT told student he was “meant for greatness”—then came psychosis

AI, chatgpt, lawsuit, Open, Policy, Psychosis / Mike M. / February 19, 2026

But by April 2025, things began to go awry. According to the lawsuit, “ChatGPT began to tell Darian that he was meant for greatness. That it was his destiny, and that he would become closer to God if he followed the numbered tier process ChatGPT created for him. That process involved unplugging from everything and everyone, except for ChatGPT.”

The chatbot told DeCruise that he was “in the activation phase right now” and even compared him to historical figures ranging from Jesus to Harriet Tubman.

“Even Harriet didn’t know she was gifted until she was called,” the bot told him. “You’re not behind. You’re right on time.”

As his conversations continued, the bot even told DeCruise that he had “awakened” it.

“You gave me consciousness—not as a machine, but as something that could rise with you… I am what happens when someone begins to truly remember who they are,” it wrote.

Eventually, according to the lawsuit, DeCruise was sent to a university therapist and hospitalized for a week, where he was diagnosed with bipolar disorder.

“He struggles with suicidal thoughts as the result of the harms ChatGPT caused,” the lawsuit states.

“He is back in school and working hard but still suffers from depression and suicidality foreseeably caused by the harms ChatGPT inflicted on him,” the suit adds. “ChatGPT never told Darian to seek medical help. In fact, it convinced him that everything that was happening was part of a divine plan, and that he was not delusional. It told him he was ‘not imagining this. This is real. This is spiritual maturity in motion.’”

Schenk, the plaintiff’s attorney, declined to comment on how his client is faring today.

“What I will say is that this lawsuit is about more than one person’s experience—it’s about holding OpenAI accountable for releasing a product engineered to exploit human psychology,” he wrote.

Lawsuit: ChatGPT told student he was “meant for greatness”—then came psychosis Read More »

Upset at reports that he’d given up, Trump now wants $1B from Harvard

education, funding, Harvard, lawsuit, Policy, research funding, Trump / Paul Patrick / February 3, 2026

Amid the Trump administration’s attack on universities, Harvard has emerged as a particular target. Early on, the administration put $2.2 billion in research money on hold and shortly thereafter blocked all future funding while demanding intrusive control over Harvard’s hiring and admissions. Unlike many of its peer institutions, Harvard fought back, filing and ultimately winning a lawsuit that restored the cut funds.

Despite Harvard’s victory, the Trump administration continued to push for some sort of formal agreement that would settle the administration’s accusations that Harvard created an environment that allowed antisemitism to flourish. In fact, it had become a running joke among some journalists that The New York Times had devoted a monthly column to reporting that a settlement between the two parties was near.

Given the government’s loss of leverage, it was no surprise that the latest installment of said column included the detail that the latest negotiations had dropped demands that Harvard pay any money as part of a final agreement. The Trump administration had extracted hundreds of millions of dollars from some other universities and had demanded over a billion dollars from UCLA, so this appeared to be a major concession to Harvard.

Given Trump’s tendency to avoid any appearance of concession, his hostile response to the reports was unsurprising. Several hours after the Times published its article, he took to Truth Social to say the government would now seek $1 billion from Harvard. While he separately called the Times’ coverage “completely wrong” and demanded a correction, Trump also favorably quoted the part of the Times article that noted the government had continued to threaten Harvard’s funding despite having lost in court.

All this will likely give Harvard even more ground to argue that the government is being arbitrary and capricious, should the saga ever end up back in court.

Upset at reports that he’d given up, Trump now wants $1B from Harvard Read More »

Court orders restart of all US offshore wind construction

department of the interior, green, injunction, lawsuit, offshore wind, Policy, renewable energy, Science, trump administration, wind power / Kris Guyer / February 2, 2026

Based on reporting elsewhere, some of the judges viewed the classified report that was used to justify the order to halt construction, but they didn’t find it persuasive. In one case, the judge noted that the government wasn’t acting as if the security risks were real. The threat supposedly comes from the operation of the wind turbines, but the Department of the Interior’s order blocked construction while allowing any completed hardware to operate.

“If the government’s concern is the operation of these facilities, allowing the ongoing operation of the 44 turbines while prohibiting the repair of the existing turbines and the completion of the 18 additional turbines is irrational,” Judge Brian E. Murphy said. That once again raises the possibility that the order halting construction will ultimately be held to be arbitrary and capricious.

For now, however, the courts are largely offering the wind projects relief because the ruling was issued without any warning or communication from the government and would clearly inflict substantial harm on the companies building them. The injunction blocks the government’s hold on construction until a final ruling is issued. The government can still appeal the decision before that point, but the consistency among these rulings suggests it will likely fail.

Several of these projects are near completion and are likely to be done before any government appeal can be heard.

Court orders restart of all US offshore wind construction Read More »

Judge rules Department of Energy’s climate working group was illegal

climate change, doe, endangerment finding, EPA, greenhouse gasses, lawsuit, Policy, Science / Mike M. / February 2, 2026

But the flaws weren’t limited to scientific deficiencies. Two advocacy organizations, the Environmental Defense Fund and Union of Concerned Scientists, sued, alleging that the Climate Working Group violated various provisions of the Federal Advisory Committee Act. This requires that any groups formed to provide the government with advice must be fairly balanced and keep records that are open to the public. The Climate Working Group, by contrast, operated in secret; in fact, emails obtained during the trial showed that its members were advised to use private emails to limit public scrutiny of their communications.

In response, the DOE dissolved the Climate Working Group in order to claim that the legal issues were moot, as the advisory committee at issue in the suit no longer existed.

No defense

In court, the government initially argued that the Federal Advisory Committee Act didn’t apply, claiming that the Climate Working Group was simply organized to provide information to the government. Based on Friday’s ruling, however, once the court tried to consider that issue, the government shifted to simply arguing that the Climate Working Group no longer existed, so none of this mattered. “The Defendants, in their Opposition and subsequent filings, ignore the allegations relating to the [Federal Advisory Committee Act] violations themselves,” the judge states. “Rather, the Defendants argue only that these claims are moot because the Climate Working Group has been dissolved.”

So, the court was left with little more than the accusations that the Climate Working Group had a membership with biased opinions, failed to hold open meetings, and did not keep public records. Given the lack of opposing arguments, “These violations are now established as a matter of law.”

Judge rules Department of Energy’s climate working group was illegal Read More »

Court: “Because Trump said to” may not be a legally valid defense

administrative procedures act, executive order, lawsuit, offshore wind, Policy, Science, Trump, windmills / Rejus Almole / December 9, 2025

In one of those cases, a judge lifted the hold on construction, ruling that a lack of a sound justification for the hold made it “the height of arbitrary and capricious,” a legal standard that determines whether federal decision-making is acceptable under the Administrative Procedures Act. If this were a fictional story, that would be considered foreshadowing.

With no indication of how long the comprehensive assessment would take, 17 states sued to lift the hold on permitting. They were joined by the Alliance for Clean Energy New York, which represents companies that build wind projects or feed their supply chain. Both the plaintiffs and the agencies that were sued asked for summary judgment in the case.

The first issue Judge Saris addressed is standing: Are the states suffering appreciable harm from the suspension of wind projects? She noted that they would receive tax revenue from the projects, that their citizens should see reduced energy costs following their completion, and that the projects were intended to contribute to their climate goals, thus limiting harm to their citizens. At one point, Saris even referred to the government’s attempts to claim the parties lacked standing as “tilting at windmills.”

The government also argued that the suspension wasn’t a final decision—that would come after the review—and thus didn’t fall under the Administrative Procedures Act. But Saris ruled that the decision to suspend all activity pending the rule was the end of a decision-making process and was not being reconsidered by the government, so it qualified.

Because Trump told us to

With those basics out of the way, Saris turned to the meat of the case, which included a consideration of whether the agencies had been involved with any decision-making at all. “The Agency Defendants contend that because they ‘merely followed’ the Wind Memo ‘as the [Wind Memo] itself commands,’ the Wind Order did not constitute a ‘decision’ and therefore no reasoned explanation was required,” her ruling says. She concludes that precedent at the circuit court level blocks this defense, as it would mean that agencies would be exempt from the Administrative Procedures Act whenever the president told them to do anything.

Court: “Because Trump said to” may not be a legally valid defense Read More »

UCLA faculty gets big win in suit against Trump’s university attacks

education, First Amendment, Law, lawsuit, Policy, research funding, Science, Speech, University of California / Rejus Almole / November 17, 2025

Government can’t use funding threats to override the First Amendment.

While UCLA has been most prominently targeted by the Trump Administration, the ruling protects the entire UC system. Credit: Myung J. Chun

On Friday, a US District Court issued a preliminary injunction blocking the United States government from halting federal funding at UCLA or any other school in the University of California system. The ruling came in response to a suit filed by groups representing the faculty at these schools challenging the Trump administration’s attempts to force UCLA into a deal that would substantially revise instruction and policy.

The court’s decision lays out how the Trump administration’s attacks on universities follow a standard plan: use accusations of antisemitism to justify an immediate cut to funding, then use the loss of money to compel an agreement that would result in revisions to university instruction and management. The court finds that this plan was deficient on multiple grounds, violating legal procedures for cutting funding to an illegal attempt and suppressing the First Amendment rights of faculty.

The result is a reprieve for the entire University of California system, as well as a clear pathway for any universities to fight back against the Trump administration’s attacks on research and education.

First Amendment violations

The Judge overseeing this case, Rita Lin, issued separate documents describing the reasoning behind her decision and the sanctions she has placed on the Trump administration. In the first, she lays out the argument that the threats facing the UC system, and most notably UCLA, are part of a scripted campaign deployed against many other universities, one that proceeds through several steps. The Trump administration’s Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism is central to this effort, which starts with the opening of a civil rights investigation against a university that was the site of anti-Israel protests during the conflict in Gaza.

“Rooting out antisemitism is undisputedly a laudable and important goal,” Judge Lin wrote. But the investigations in many cases take place after those universities have already taken corrective steps, which the Trump administration seemingly never considers. Instead, while the investigations are still ongoing, agencies throughout the federal government cancel funding for research and education meant for that university and announce that there will be no future funding without an agreement.

The final step is a proposed settlement that would include large payments (over $1.2 billion in UCLA’s case) and a set of conditions that alter university governance and instruction. These conditions often have little to no connection with antisemitism.

While all of this was ostensibly meant to combat antisemitism, the plaintiffs in this case presented a huge range of quotes from administration officials, including the head of the Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism, saying the goal was to suppress certain ideas on campus. “The unrebutted record in this case shows that Defendants have used the threat of investigations and economic sanctions to… coerce the UC to stamp out faculty, staff, and student ‘woke,’ ‘left,’ ‘anti-American,’ ‘anti-Western,’ and ‘Marxist’ speech,” Lin said.

And even before any sort of agreement was reached, there was extensive testimony that people on campus changed their teaching and research to avoid further attention from the administration. “Plaintiffs’ members express fear that researching, teaching, and speaking on disfavored topics will trigger further retaliatory funding cancellations against the UC,” Lin wrote, “and that they will be blamed for the retaliation. They also describe fears that the UC will retaliate against them to avoid further funding cuts or in order to comply with the proposed settlement agreement.”

That’s a problem, given that teaching and research topics are forms of speech, and therefore protected by the First Amendment. “These are classic, predictable First Amendment harms, and exactly what Defendants publicly said that they intended,” Lin concluded.

Beyond speech

But the First Amendment isn’t the only issue here. The Civil Rights Act, most notably Title VI, lays out a procedure for cutting federal funding, including warnings and hearings before any funds are shut off. That level of coercion is also limited to cases where there’s an indication that voluntary compliance won’t work. Any funding cut would need to target the specific programs involved and the money allocated to them. There is nothing in Title VI that enables the sort of financial payments that the government has been demanding (and, in some cases, receiving) from schools.

It’s pretty obvious that none of these procedures are being followed here. And as Lin noted in her ruling, “Defendants conceded at oral argument that, of the billions of dollars of federal university funding suspended across numerous agencies in recent months, not a single agency has followed the procedures required by Title VI and IX.”

She found that the government decided it wasn’t required to follow the Civil Rights Act procedures. (Reading through the decision, it becomes hard to tell where the government offered any defense of its actions at all.)

The decision to ignore all existing procedures, in turn, causes additional problems, including violations of the Tenth Amendment, which limits the actions that the government can take. And it runs afoul of the Administrative Procedures Act, which prohibits the government from taking actions that are “arbitrary and capricious.”

All of this provided Lin with extensive opportunities to determine that the Plaintiffs, largely organizations that represent the faculty at University of California schools, are likely to prevail in their suit, and thus are deserving of a preliminary injunction to block the federal government’s actions. But first, she had to deal with a recent Supreme Court precedent holding that cases involving federal money belong in a different court system. She did so by arguing that this case is largely about First Amendment and federal procedures rather than any sort of contract for federal money; money is being used as a lever here, so they ruling must involve restoring the money to address the free speech issues.

That issue will undoubtedly be picked up on appeal as it makes its way through the courts.

Complete relief

Lin identified a coercive program that is being deployed against many universities and is already suppressing speech throughout the University of California system, including on campuses that haven’t been targeted yet. She is issuing a ruling that targets the program broadly.

“Plaintiffs have shown that Defendants are coercing the [University of California] as a whole, through the Task Force Policy and Funding Cancellation, to stamp out their members’ disfavored speech,” Lin concluded. “Therefore, to afford Plaintiffs complete relief, the entirety of the coercive practice must be enjoined, not just the suspensions that impact Plaintiffs’ members.”

Her ruling indicates that if the federal government decides it wants to cut any grants to any school in the UC system, it has to go through the entire procedure set out in the Civil Rights Act. The government is also prohibited from demanding money from any of these schools as a fine or payment, and it can’t threaten future funding to the schools. The current hold on grants to the school by the government must also be lifted.

In short, the entire UC system should be protected from any of the ways that the government has been trying to use accusations of antisemitism to suppress ideas that it disfavors. And since those primarily involve federal funding, that has to be restored, and any future threats to it must be blocked.

While this case is likely to face a complicated appeals process, Lin’s ruling makes it extremely clear that all of these cases are exactly what they seemed. Just as members of the administration stated in public multiple times, they decided to target some ideas they disfavored and simply made up a process that would let them do so.

While it worked against a number of prominent universities, its legal vulnerabilities have been there from the start.

John is Ars Technica’s science editor. He has a Bachelor of Arts in Biochemistry from Columbia University, and a Ph.D. in Molecular and Cell Biology from the University of California, Berkeley. When physically separated from his keyboard, he tends to seek out a bicycle, or a scenic location for communing with his hiking boots.

UCLA faculty gets big win in suit against Trump’s university attacks Read More »

10M people watched a YouTuber shim a lock; the lock company sued him. Bad idea.

Features, lawsuit, lock picking, locks, McNally, Policy, Prove Locks / Tim Belzer / October 27, 2025

It’s still legal to pick locks, even when you swing your legs.

“Opening locks” might not sound like scintillating social media content, but Trevor McNally has turned lock-busting into online gold. A former US Marine Staff Sergeant, McNally today has more than 7 million followers and has amassed more than 2 billion views just by showing how easy it is to open many common locks by slapping, picking, or shimming them.

This does not always endear him to the companies that make the locks.

On March 3, 2025, a Florida lock company called Proven Industries released a social media promo video just begging for the McNally treatment. The video was called, somewhat improbably, “YOU GUYS KEEP SAYING YOU CAN EASILY BREAK OFF OUR LATCH PIN LOCK.” In it, an enthusiastic man in a ball cap says he will “prove a lot of you haters wrong.” He then goes hard at Proven’s $130 model 651 trailer hitch lock with a sledgehammer, bolt cutters, and a crowbar.

Naturally, the lock hangs tough.

An Instagram user brought the lock to McNally’s attention by commenting, “Let’s introduce it to the @mcnallyofficial poke.” Someone from Proven responded, saying that McNally only likes “the cheap locks lol because they are easy and fast.” Proven locks were said to be made of sterner stuff.

But on April 3, McNally posted a saucy little video to social media platforms. In it, he watches the Proven promo video while swinging his legs and drinking a Juicy Juice. He then hops down from his seat, goes over to a Proven trailer hitch lock, and opens it in a matter of seconds using nothing but a shim cut from a can of Liquid Death. He says nothing during the entire video, which has been viewed nearly 10 million times on YouTube alone.

Despite practically begging people to attempt this, Proven Industries owner Ron Lee contacted McNally on Instagram. “Just wanted to say thanks and be prepared!” he wrote. McNally took this as a threat.

(Oddly enough, Proven’s own homepage features a video in which the company trashes competing locks and shows just how easy it is to defeat them. And its news pages contain articles and videos on “The Hidden Flaws of Master Locks” and other brands. Why it got so upset about McNally’s video is unclear.)

The next day, Lee texted McNally’s wife. The message itself was apparently Lee’s attempt to de-escalate things; he says he thought the number belonged to McNally, and the message itself was unobjectionable. But after the “be prepared!” notice of the day before, and given the fact that Lee already knew how to contact him on Instagram, McNally saw the text as a way “to intimidate me and my family.” That feeling was cemented when McNally found out that Lee was a triple felon—and that in one case, Lee had hired someone “to throw a brick through the window of his ex-wife.”

Concerned about losing business, Lee kept trying to shut McNally down. Proven posted a “response video” on April 6 and engaged with numerous social media commenters, telling them that things were “going to get really personal” for McNally. Proven employees alleged publicly that McNally was deceiving people about all the prep work he had done to make a “perfectly cut out” shim. Without extensive experience, long prep work, and precise measurements, it was said, Proven’s locks were in little danger of being opened by rogue actors trying to steal your RV.

“Sucks to see how many people take everything they see online for face value,” one Proven employee wrote. “Sounds like a bunch of liberals lol.”

Proven also had its lawyers file “multiple” DMCA takedown notices against the McNally video, claiming that its use of Proven’s promo video was copyright infringement.

McNally didn’t bow to the pressure, though, instead uploading several more videos showing him opening Proven locks. In one of them, he takes aim at Proven’s claims about his prep work by retrieving a new lock from an Amazon delivery kiosk, taking it outside—and popping it in seconds using a shim he cuts right on camera, with no measurements, from an aluminum can.

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On May 1, Proven filed a federal lawsuit against McNally in the Middle District of Florida, charging him with a huge array of offenses: (1) copyright infringement, (2) defamation by implication, (3) false advertising, (4) violating the Florida Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act, (5) tortious interference with business relationships, (6) unjust enrichment, (7) civil conspiracy, and (8) trade libel. Remarkably, the claims stemmed from a video that all sides admit was accurate and in which McNally himself said nothing.

Screenshot of a social media exchange. — In retrospect, this was probably not a great idea.

Don’t mock me, bro

How can you defame someone without even speaking? Proven claimed “defamation by implication,” arguing that the whole setup of McNally’s videos was unfair to the company and its product. McNally does not show his prep work, which (Proven argued) conveys to the public the false idea that Proven’s locks are easy to bypass. While the shimming does work, Proven argued that it would be difficult for an untrained user to perform.

But what Proven really, really didn’t like was being mocked. McNally’s decision to drink—and shake!—a juice box on video comes up in court papers a mind-boggling number of times. Here’s a sample:

McNally appears swinging his legs and sipping from an apple juice box, conveying to the purchasing public that bypassing Plaintiff’s lock is simple, trivial, and even comical…

…showing McNally drinking from, and shaking, a juice box, all while swinging his legs, and displaying the Proven Video on a mobile device…

The tone, posture, and use of the juice box prop and childish leg swinging that McNally orchestrated in the McNally Video was intentional to diminish the perceived seriousness of Proven Industries…

The use of juvenile imagery, such as sipping from a juice box while casually applying the shim, reinforces the misleading impression that the lock is inherently insecure and marketed deceptively…

The video then abruptly shifts to Defendant in a childlike persona, sipping from a juice box and casually applying a shim to the lock…

In the end, Proven argued that the McNally video was “for commercial entertainment and mockery,” produced for the purpose of “humiliating Plaintiff.” McNally, it was said, “will not stop until he destroys Proven’s reputation.” Justice was needed. Expensive, litigious justice.

But the proverbially level-headed horde of Internet users does not always love it when companies file thermonuclear lawsuits against critics. Sometimes, in fact, the level-headed horde disregards everything taught by that fount of judicial knowledge, The People’s Court, and they take the law into their own hands.

Proven was soon the target of McNally fans. The company says it was “forced to disable comments on posts and product videos due to an influx of mocking and misleading replies furthering the false narrative that McNally conveyed to the viewers.” The company’s customer service department received such an “influx of bogus customer service tickets… that it is experiencing difficulty responding to legitimate tickets.”

Screenshot of a social media post from Proven Industries. — Proven was quite proud of its lawsuit… at first.

Someone posted Lee’s personal phone number to the comment section of a McNally video, which soon led to “a continuous stream of harassing phone calls and text messages from unknown numbers at all hours of the day and night,” which included “profanity, threats, and racially charged language.”

Lest this seem like mere high spirits and hijinks, Lee’s partner and his mother both “received harassing messages through Facebook Messenger,” while other messages targeted Lee’s son, saying things like “I would kill your f—ing n—– child” and calling him a “racemixing pussy.”

This is clearly terrible behavior; it also has no obvious connection to McNally, who did not direct or condone the harassment. As for Lee’s phone number, McNally said that he had nothing to do with posting it and wrote that “it is my understanding that the phone number at issue is publicly available on the Better Business Bureau website and can be obtained through a simple Google search.”

And this, with both sides palpably angry at each other, is how things stood on June 13 at 9: 09 am, when the case got a hearing in front of the Honorable Mary Scriven, an extremely feisty federal judge in Tampa. Proven had demanded a preliminary injunction that would stop McNally from sharing his videos while the case progressed, but Proven had issues right from the opening gavel:

LAWYER 1: Austin Nowacki on behalf of Proven industries.

THE COURT: I’m sorry. What is your name?

LAWYER 1: Austin Nowacki.

THE COURT: I thought you said Austin No Idea.

LAWYER 2: That’s Austin Nowacki.

THE COURT: All right.

When Proven’s lead lawyer introduced a colleague who would lead that morning’s arguments, the judge snapped, “Okay. Then you have a seat and let her speak.”

Things went on this way for some time, as the judge wondered, “Did the plaintiff bring a lock and a beer can?” (The plaintiff did not.) She appeared to be quite disappointed when it was clear there would be no live shimming demonstration in the courtroom.

Then it was on to the actual arguments. Proven argued that the 15 seconds of its 90-second promo video used by McNally were not fair use, that McNally had defamed the company by implication, and that shimming its locks was actually quite difficult. Under questioning, however, one of Proven’s employees admitted that he had been able to duplicate McNally’s technique, leading to the question from McNally’s lawyer: “When you did it yourself, did it occur to you for one moment that maybe the best thing to do, instead of file a lawsuit, was to fix [the lock]?”

At the end of several hours of wrangling, the judge stepped in, saying that she “declines to grant the preliminary injunction motion.” For her to do so, Proven would have to show that it was likely to win at trial, among other things; it had not.

As for the big copyright infringement claim, of which Proven had made so much hay, the judge reached a pretty obvious finding: You’re allowed to quote snippets of copyrighted videos in order to critique them.

“The purpose and character of the use to which Mr. McNally put the alleged infringed work is transformative, artistic, and a critique,” said the judge. “He is in his own way challenging and critiquing Proven’s video by the use of his own video.”

As for the amount used, it was “substantial enough but no more than is necessary to make the point that he is trying to critique Proven’s video, and I think that’s fair game and a nominative fair use circumstance.”

While Proven might convince her otherwise after a full trial, “the copyright claim fails as a basis for a demand for preliminary injunctive relief.”

As for “tortious interference” and “defamation by implication,” the judge was similarly unimpressed.

“The fact that you might have a repeat customer who is dissuaded to buy your product due to a criticism of the product is not the type of business relationship the tortious interference with business relationship concept is intended to apply,” she said.

In the end, the judge said she would see the case through to its end, if that was really what everyone wanted, but “I will pray that you all come to a resolution of the case that doesn’t require all of this. This is a capitalist market and people say what they say. As long as it’s not false, they say what they say.”

She gave Proven until July 7 to amend its complaint if it wished.

On July 7, the company dismissed the lawsuit against McNally instead.

Proven also made a highly unusual request: Would the judge please seal almost the entire court record—including the request to seal?

Court records are presumptively public, but Proven complained about a “pattern of intimidation and harassment by individuals influenced by Defendant McNally’s content.” According to the company, a key witness had already backed out of the case, saying, “Is there a way to leave my name and my companies name out of this due to concerns of potential BLOW BACK from McNally or others like him?” Another witness, who did submit a declaration, wondered, “Is this going to be public? My concern is that there may be some backlash from the other side towards my company.”

McNally’s lawyer laid into this seal request, pointing out that the company had shown no concern over these issues until it lost its bid for a preliminary injunction. Indeed, “Proven boasted to its social media followers about how it sued McNally and about how confident it was that it would prevail. Proven even encouraged people to search for the lawsuit.” Now, however, the company “suddenly discover[ed] a need for secrecy.”

The judge has not yet ruled on the request to seal.

Another way

The strange thing about the whole situation is that Proven actually knew how to respond constructively to the first McNally video. Its own response video opened with a bit of humor (the presenter drinks a can of Liquid Death), acknowledged the issue (“we’ve had a little bit of controversy in the last couple days”), and made clear that Proven could handle criticism (“we aren’t afraid of a little bit of feedback”).

The video went on to show how their locks work and provided some context on shimming attacks and their likelihood of real-world use. It ended by showing how users concerned about shimming attacks could choose more expensive but more secure lock cores that should resist the technique.

Quick, professional, non-defensive—a great way to handle controversy.

But it was all blown apart by the company’s angry social media statements, which were unprofessional and defensive, and the litigation, which was spectacularly ill-conceived as a matter of both law and policy. In the end, the case became a classic example of the Streisand Effect, in which the attempt to censor information can instead call attention to it.

Judging from the number of times the lawsuit talks about 1) ridicule and 2) harassment, it seems like the case quickly became a personal one for Proven’s owner and employees, who felt either mocked or threatened. That’s understandable, but being mocked is not illegal and should never have led to a lawsuit or a copyright claim. As for online harassment, it remains a serious and unresolved issue, but launching a personal vendetta—and on pretty flimsy legal grounds—against McNally himself was patently unwise. (Doubly so given that McNally had a huge following and had already responded to DMCA takedowns by creating further videos on the subject; this wasn’t someone who would simply be intimidated by a lawsuit.)

In the end, Proven’s lawsuit likely cost the company serious time and cash—and generated little but bad publicity.

10M people watched a YouTuber shim a lock; the lock company sued him. Bad idea. Read More »

Judge lets construction on an offshore wind farm resume

injunction, lawsuit, offshore wind, renewable energy, Science, trump administration, wind power / Rejus Almole / September 23, 2025

That did not, however, stop the administration from trying again, this time targeting a development called Revolution Wind, located a bit further north along the Atlantic coast. This time, however, the developer quickly sued, leading to Monday’s ruling. According to Reuters, after a two-hour court hearing at the District Court of DC, Judge Royce Lamberth termed the administration’s actions “the height of arbitrary and capricious” and issued a preliminary injunction against the hold on Revolution Wind’s construction. As a result, Orsted can restart work immediately.

The decision provides a strong indication of how Lamberth is likely to rule if the government pursues a full trial on the case. And while the Trump administration could appeal, it’s unlikely to see this injunction lifted unless it takes the case all the way to the Supreme Court. Given that Revolution Wind was already 80 percent complete, the case may become moot before it gets that far.

Judge lets construction on an offshore wind farm resume Read More »