Policy – Page 23

5th Circuit rules geofence warrants illegal in win for phone users’ privacy

5th circuit, geofence warrants, Policy / Mike M. / August 13, 2024

Illustration of map pins on a cityscape in an abstract representation of network connections — Getty Images |

A federal appeals court ruled on Friday that geofence warrants, which are used to identify all users or devices in a geographic area, are prohibited by the Fourth Amendment’s protection against unreasonable searches.

The ruling was issued by the US Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit, which is generally regarded as the most conservative appeals court. The 5th Circuit holding creates a circuit split with the 4th Circuit, which last month rejected a different Fourth Amendment challenge to geofence warrants.

“This court ‘cannot forgive the requirements of the Fourth Amendment in the name of law enforcement.’ Accordingly, we hold that geofence warrants are general warrants categorically prohibited by the Fourth Amendment,” the August 9 ruling from the 5th Circuit said.

The case, United States v. Smith, involves three Mississippi men convicted of a 2018 armed robbery of a mail truck. Despite ruling geofence warrants to be unconstitutional, the 5th Circuit denied the convicts’ motion to suppress evidence because “law enforcement acted in good faith in relying on this type of warrant.”

“We hold that geofence warrants are modern-day general warrants and are unconstitutional under the Fourth Amendment. However, considering law enforcement’s reasonable conduct in this case in light of the novelty of this type of warrant, we uphold the district court’s determination that suppression was unwarranted under the good-faith exception,” the court said.

4th Amendment scholar stunned

Despite the evidence being allowed, the court’s overall holding against geofence warrants is significant. The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) called the 5th Circuit ruling “a major decision.”

“Closely following arguments EFF has made in a number of cases, the court found that geofence warrants constitute the sort of ‘general, exploratory rummaging’ that the drafters of the Fourth Amendment intended to outlaw. EFF applauds this decision because it is essential that every person feels like they can simply take their cell phone out into the world without the fear that they might end up a criminal suspect because their location data was swept up in an open-ended digital dragnet,” the nonprofit group focused on digital rights said.

The ruling impressed Berkeley Law Professor Orin Kerr, a Fourth Amendment scholar. The 5th Circuit decision “makes my jaw drop,” he wrote in a post on Reason’s Volokh Conspiracy blog.

“The case creates a split with the Fourth Circuit on one important issue, and it creates another split with the Colorado Supreme Court on an even more important issue,” Kerr wrote.

The 4th Circuit ruling on July 9, in United States v. Chatrie, said “that the government did not conduct a Fourth Amendment search when it obtained two hours’ worth of Chatrie’s location information, since he voluntarily exposed this information to Google.” The 4th Circuit panel vote was 2-1.

It’s no coincidence that Google was involved in both the 4th and 5th Circuit cases. “Geofence warrants require a provider—almost always Google—to search its entire reserve of user location data to identify all users or devices located within a geographic area during a time period specified by law enforcement,” the EFF explained in December 2023 after Google implemented a technical change that could make it harder to provide mass location data in response to such warrants.

Geofence warrants skyrocketed

Requests for geofence warrants have skyrocketed since Google received its first such request in 2016. “In 2019, Google was receiving about 180 geofence warrant requests per week from law enforcement around the country, amounting to about 9,000 geofence requests for that year,” the 5th Circuit ruling said. “By 2020, that number went up to 11,500 geofence warrant requests. By 2021, geofence warrants comprised more than 25 percent of all warrant requests Google received in the United States.”

Kerr’s post explained why he thinks the 5th Circuit ruling is so significant:

The Fifth Circuit makes two important holdings. First, accessing any amount of geofence records is a search under an expansive reading of Carpenter v. United States [a 2018 Supreme Court ruling]. That’s the issue that creates the split with the Fourth Circuit in United States v. Chatrie. As I noted just a few weeks ago, Chatrie held that accessing such records is not a search in the first place, at least if the records sought are relatively limited in scale. The Fifth Circuit expressly disagrees.

Second, and much more dramatically, the Fifth Circuit rules that because the database of geofence records is so large, and because the whole database must be scanned through to find matches, the Fourth Amendment does not allow courts to issue warrants to collect those records. In legal terms, it is impossible to have a warrant particular enough to authorize the surveillance. The government can’t gather these kinds of online records at all, in other words, even with a warrant based on probable cause. This holding conflicts with a recent ruling of the Colorado Supreme Court, People v. Seymour, and more broadly raises questions of whether any digital warrants for online contents are constitutional.

After the 2018 mail-truck robbery, video from a camera at a nearby farm office appeared to show a suspect using a cell phone. But in November 2018, “nine months after the robbery, the Postal Inspection Service had not been able to identify any suspects from video footage or witness interviews,” the 5th Circuit ruling said.

Postal inspectors who were on the case initially didn’t know what a geofence warrant is. When they learned about this type of warrant, they applied for one “seeking information from Google to locate potential suspects and witnesses in connection to the robbery.” The geofence warrant “authorized an hour-long search… within a geofence covering approximately 98,192 square meters around the Lake Cormorant Post Office.”

5th Circuit rules geofence warrants illegal in win for phone users’ privacy Read More »

Ex-Twitter staffer wins $600K over Musk’s click-yes-or-resign ultimatum

elon musk, employment law, ireland, Labor law, Policy, severance, Twitter, x corp / Paul Patrick / August 13, 2024

Please, be reasonable —

Elon Musk’s 24-hour email ultimatum unfairly dismissed Twitter staff, court says.

Ashley Belanger – Aug 13, 2024 6: 35 pm UTC

Elon Musk had no business sending Twitter employees an email giving them 24 hours to click “yes” to keep their jobs or else voluntarily resign during his takeover in 2022, an Irish workplace watchdog ruled Monday.

Not only did the email not provide staff with enough notice, the labor court ruled, but also any employee’s failure to click “yes” could in no way constitute a legal act of resignation. Instead, the court reviewed evidence alleging that the email appeared designed to either get employees to agree to new employment terms, sight unseen, or else push employees to volunteer for dismissal during a time of mass layoffs across Twitter.

“Going forward, to build a breakthrough Twitter 2.0 and succeed in an increasingly competitive world, we will need to be extremely hardcore,” Musk wrote in the all-staff email. “This will mean working long hours at high intensity. Only exceptional performance will constitute a passing grade.”

With the subject line, “A Fork in the Road,” the email urged staff, “if you are sure that you want to be part of the new Twitter, please click yes on the link below. Anyone who has not done so by 5pm ET tomorrow (Thursday) will receive three months of severance. Whatever decision you make, thank you for your efforts to make Twitter successful.”

In a 73-page ruling, an adjudication officer for the Irish Workplace Relations Commission (WRC), Michael MacNamee, ruled that Twitter’s abrupt dismissal of an Ireland-based senior executive, Gary Rooney, was unfair, the Irish public service broadcaster RTÉ reported. Rooney had argued that his contract clearly stated that his resignation must be provided in writing, not by refraining to fill out a form.

A spokesperson for the Department of Enterprise, Trade, and Employment, which handles the WRC’s media inquiries, told Ars that the decision will be published on the WRC’s website on August 26 after both parties have “the opportunity to consider it in full.”

Now, instead of paying Rooney the draft severance amount worth a little more than $25,000, Twitter, which is now called X, has to pay Rooney more than $600,000. According to many outlets, this is a record award from the WRC and included about $220,000 “for prospective future loss of earnings.”

The WRC dismissed Rooney’s claim regarding an allegedly owed performance bonus for 2022 but otherwise largely agreed with his arguments on the unfair dismissal.

Rooney had worked for Twitter for nine years prior to Musk’s takeover, telling the WRC that he previously loved his job but had no way of knowing from the “Fork in the Road” email “what package was being offered” or “implications of agreeing to stay working for Twitter.” He hesitated to click yes, not knowing how his benefits or stock options might change, while discussing his decision to potentially leave with other Twitter employees on Slack and claiming he would be leaving on Twitter.

Twitter tried to argue that the Slack discussions and Rooney’s tweets about the email indicated that he intended to resign, but the court disagreed that these were relevant.

“No employee when faced with such a situation could possibly be faulted for refusing to be compelled to give an open-ended unqualified assent to any of the proposals,” MacNamee said.

In total, 35 Twitter staffers didn’t click “yes”

A lot of laid-off employees sued Twitter after Musk’s takeover, and so far, X has seemed to come out ahead. The company has beaten at least one lawsuit while also threatening to claw back money it claims it “overpaid” Australian employees who were laid off. (X says it bungled the conversion from Australian to US dollars.) Rooney’s suit is among the first major victories for laid-off Twitter staffers fighting Musk’s allegedly unfair and penny-pinching severance packages.

X’s senior director of human resources, Lauren Wegman, testified that of the 270 employees in Ireland who received the email, only 35 did not click yes. After this week’s ruling, it seems likely that X may face more complaints from any of those dozens of employees who took the same route Rooney did.

X has not commented on the ruling but is likely disappointed by the loss. The social media company had tried to argue that Rooney’s employment contract “allowed the company to make reasonable changes to its terms and conditions,” RTÉ reported. Wegman had further testified that it was unreasonable for Rooney to believe his pay might change as a result of clicking yes, telling the WRC that his “employment would probably not have ended if he had raised a grievance” within the 24-hour deadline, RTÉ reported.

Rooney’s lawyer, Barry Kenny, told The Guardian that Rooney and his legal team welcomed “the clear and unambiguous finding that my client did not resign from his employment but was unfairly dismissed from his job, notwithstanding his excellent employment record and contribution to the company over the years.”

“It is not okay for Mr. Musk, or indeed any large company to treat employees in such a manner in this country,” Kenny said. “The record award reflects the seriousness and the gravity of the case.”

Twitter will be able to appeal the WRC’s decision, The Journal reported.

Ex-Twitter staffer wins $600K over Musk’s click-yes-or-resign ultimatum Read More »

Google abruptly shuts down AdSense in Russia as tensions with Kremlin escalate

ad manager, ad monetization, AdSense, censorship, content monetization, Google, kremlin, online advertising, Policy, russia, Russian invasion of Ukraine, youtube / Paul Patrick / August 12, 2024

“Kind of strange” —

Russia-based YouTubers, in particular, will likely lose significant revenues.

Ashley Belanger – Aug 12, 2024 8: 36 pm UTC

Google announced Monday that it’s shutting down all AdSense accounts in Russia due to “ongoing developments in Russia.”

This effectively ends Russian content creators’ ability to monetize their posts, including YouTube videos. The change impacts accounts monetizing content through AdSense, AdMob, and Ad Manager, the support page said.

While Google has declined requests to provide details on what prompted the change, it’s the latest escalation of Google’s ongoing battle with Russian officials working to control the narrative on Russia’s war with Ukraine.

In February 2022, Google paused monetization of all state-funded media in Russia, then temporarily paused all ads in the country the very next month. That March, Google paused the creation of new Russia-based AdSense accounts and blocked ads globally that originated from Russia. In March 2022, Google also paused monetization of any content exploiting, condoning, or dismissing Russia’s war with Ukraine. Seemingly as retaliation, Russia seized Google’s bank account, causing Google Russia to shut down in May 2022.

Since then, Google has “blocked more than 1,000 YouTube channels, including state-sponsored news, and over 5.5 million videos,” Reuters reported.

For Russian creators who have still found ways to monetize their content amid the chaos, Google’s decision to abruptly shut down AdSense accounts comes as “a serious blow to their income,” Bleeping Computer reported. Russia is second only to the US in terms of YouTube web traffic, Similarweb data shows, making it likely that Russia-based YouTubers earned “significant” revenues that will now be suddenly lost, Bleeping Computer reported.

Russia-based creators—including YouTubers, as well as bloggers and website owners—will receive their final payout this month, according to a message from Google to users reviewed by Reuters.

“Assuming you have no active payment holds and meet the minimum payment thresholds,” payments will be disbursed between August 21 and 26, Google’s message said.

Google’s spokesperson offered little clarification to Reuters and Bleeping Computer, saying only that “we will no longer be able to make payments to Russia-based AdSense accounts that have been able to continue monetizing traffic outside of Russia. As a result, we will be deactivating these accounts effective August 2024.”

It seems likely, though, that Russia passing a law in March—banning advertising on websites, blogs, social networks, or any other online sources published by a “foreign agent,” as Reuters reported in February—perhaps influenced Google’s update. The law also prohibited foreign agents from placing ads on sites, and under the law, foreign agents could include anti-Kremlin politicians, activists, and media. With new authority, Russia may have further retaliated against Google, potentially forcing Google to give up the last bit of monetization available to Russia-based creators increasingly censored online.

State assembly member and Putin ally Vyacheslav Volodin said that the law was needed to stop financing “scoundrels” allegedly “killing our soldiers, officers, and civilians,” Reuters reported.

One Russian YouTuber with 11.4 million subscribers, Valentin Petukhov, suggested on Telegram that Google shut down AdSense because people had managed to “bypass payment blocks imposed by Western sanctions on Russian banks,” Bleeping Computer reported.

According to Petukhov, the wording in Google’s message to users was “kind of strange,” making it unclear what account holders should do next.

“Even though the income from monetization has fallen tenfold, it hasn’t disappeared completely,” Petukhov said.

YouTube still spotty in Russia

Google’s decision to end AdSense in Russia follows reports of a mass YouTube outage that Russian Internet monitoring service Sboi.rf reported is still impacting users today.

Officials in Russia claim that YouTube has been operating at slower speeds because Google stopped updating its equipment in the region after the invasion of Ukraine, Reuters reported.

This outage and the slower speeds led “subscribers of over 135 regional communication operators in Russia” to terminate “agreements with companies due to problems with the operation of YouTube and other Google services,” the Russian tech blog Habr reported.

As Google has tried to resist pressure from Russian lawmakers to censor content that officials deem illegal, such as content supporting Ukraine or condemning Russia, YouTube had become one of the last bastions of online free speech, Reuters reported. It’s unclear how ending monetization in the region will impact access to anti-Kremlin reporting on YouTube or more broadly online in Russia. Last February, a popular journalist with 1.64 million subscribers on YouTube, Katerina Gordeeva, wrote on Telegram that “she was suspending her work due to the law,” Reuters reported.

“We will no longer be able to work as before,” Gordeeva said. “Of course, we will look for a way out.”

Google abruptly shuts down AdSense in Russia as tensions with Kremlin escalate Read More »

RFK Jr’s anti-vaccine group can’t sue Meta for agreeing with CDC, judge rules

anti-vaccine, censorship, children's health defense, disinformation, facebook, First Amendment, free speech, Instagram, Meta, misinformation, Policy, robert f kennedy jr / Paul Patrick / August 12, 2024

Enlarge / Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

The Children’s Health Defense (CHD), an anti-vaccine group founded by Robert F. Kennedy Jr, has once again failed to convince a court that Meta acted as a state agent when censoring the group’s posts and ads on Facebook and Instagram.

In his opinion affirming a lower court’s dismissal, US Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Eric Miller wrote that CHD failed to prove that Meta acted as an arm of the government in censoring posts. Concluding that Meta’s right to censor views that the platforms find “distasteful” is protected by the First Amendment, Miller denied CHD’s requested relief, which had included an injunction and civil monetary damages.

“Meta evidently believes that vaccines are safe and effective and that their use should be encouraged,” Miller wrote. “It does not lose the right to promote those views simply because they happen to be shared by the government.”

CHD told Reuters that the group “was disappointed with the decision and considering its legal options.”

The group first filed the complaint in 2020, arguing that Meta colluded with government officials to censor protected speech by labeling anti-vaccine posts as misleading or removing and shadowbanning CHD posts. This caused CHD’s traffic on the platforms to plummet, CHD claimed, and ultimately, its pages were removed from both platforms.

However, critically, Miller wrote, CHD did not allege that “the government was actually involved in the decisions to label CHD’s posts as ‘false’ or ‘misleading,’ the decision to put the warning label on CHD’s Facebook page, or the decisions to ‘demonetize’ or ‘shadow-ban.'”

“CHD has not alleged facts that allow us to infer that the government coerced Meta into implementing a specific policy,” Miller wrote.

Instead, Meta “was entitled to encourage” various “input from the government,” justifiably seeking vaccine-related information provided by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) as it navigated complex content moderation decisions throughout the pandemic, Miller wrote.

Therefore, Meta’s actions against CHD were due to “Meta’s own ‘policy of censoring,’ not any provision of federal law,” Miller concluded. “The evidence suggested that Meta had independent incentives to moderate content and exercised its own judgment in so doing.”

None of CHD’s theories that Meta coordinated with officials to deprive “CHD of its constitutional rights” were plausible, Miller wrote, whereas the “innocent alternative”—”that Meta adopted the policy it did simply because” CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Meta “share the government’s view that vaccines are safe and effective”—appeared “more plausible.”

Meta “does not become an agent of the government just because it decides that the CDC sometimes has a point,” Miller wrote.

Equally not persuasive were CHD’s notions that Section 230 immunity—which shields platforms from liability for third-party content—”‘removed all legal barriers’ to the censorship of vaccine-related speech,” such that “Meta’s restriction of that content should be considered state action.”

“That Section 230 operates in the background to immunize Meta if it chooses to suppress vaccine misinformation—whether because it shares the government’s health concerns or for independent commercial reasons—does not transform Meta’s choice into state action,” Miller wrote.

One judge dissented over Section 230 concerns

In his dissenting opinion, Judge Daniel Collins defended CHD’s Section 230 claim, however, suggesting that the appeals court erred and should have granted CHD injunctive and declaratory relief from alleged censorship. CHD CEO Mary Holland told The Defender that the group was pleased the decision was not unanimous.

According to Collins, who like Miller is a Trump appointee, Meta could never have built its massive social platforms without Section 230 immunity, which grants platforms the ability to broadly censor viewpoints they disfavor.

It was “important to keep in mind” that “the vast practical power that Meta exercises over the speech of millions of others ultimately rests on a government-granted privilege to which Meta is not constitutionally entitled,” Collins wrote. And this power “makes a crucial difference in the state-action analysis.”

As Collins sees it, CHD could plausibly allege that Meta’s communications with government officials about vaccine-related misinformation targeted specific users, like the “disinformation dozen” that includes both CHD and Kennedy. In that case, it appears possible to Collins that Section 230 provides a potential opportunity for government to target speech that it disfavors through mechanisms provided by the platforms.

“Having specifically and purposefully created an immunized power for mega-platform operators to freely censor the speech of millions of persons on those platforms, the Government is perhaps unsurprisingly tempted to then try to influence particular uses of such dangerous levers against protected speech expressing viewpoints the Government does not like,” Collins warned.

He further argued that “Meta’s relevant First Amendment rights” do not “give Meta an unbounded freedom to work with the Government in suppressing speech on its platforms.” Disagreeing with the majority, he wrote that “in this distinctive scenario, applying the state-action doctrine promotes individual liberty by keeping the Government’s hands away from the tempting levers of censorship on these vast platforms.”

The majority agreed, however, that while Section 230 immunity “is undoubtedly a significant benefit to companies like Meta,” lawmakers’ threats to weaken Section 230 did not suggest that Meta’s anti-vaccine policy was coerced state action.

“Many companies rely, in one way or another, on a favorable regulatory environment or the goodwill of the government,” Miller wrote. “If that were enough for state action, every large government contractor would be a state actor. But that is not the law.”

RFK Jr’s anti-vaccine group can’t sue Meta for agreeing with CDC, judge rules Read More »

Push alerts from TikTok include fake news, expired tsunami warning

algorithms, fake news, misinformation, Policy, syndication, tiktok, Uncategorized / Mike M. / August 12, 2024

Broken —

News-style notifications include false claims about Taylor Swift, other misleading info.

Stephanie Stacy, Financial Times – Aug 12, 2024 1: 34 pm UTC

FT montage/Getty Images

TikTok has been sending inaccurate and misleading news-style alerts to users’ phones, including a false claim about Taylor Swift and a weeks-old disaster warning, intensifying fears about the spread of misinformation on the popular video-sharing platform.

Among alerts seen by the Financial Times was a warning about a tsunami in Japan, labeled “BREAKING,” that was posted in late January, three weeks after an earthquake had struck.

Other notifications falsely stated that “Taylor Swift Canceled All Tour Dates in What She Called ‘Racist Florida’” and highlighted a five-year “ban” for a US baseball player that originated as an April Fool’s day prank.

The notifications, which sometimes contain summaries from user-generated posts, pop up on screen in the style of a news alert. Researchers say that format, adopted widely to boost engagement through personalized video recommendations, may make users less critical of the veracity of the content and open them up to misinformation.

“Notifications have this additional stamp of authority,” said Laura Edelson, a researcher at Northeastern University, in Boston. “When you get a notification about something, it’s often assumed to be something that has been curated by the platform and not just a random thing from your feed.”

Social media groups such as TikTok, X, and Meta are facing greater scrutiny to police their platforms, particularly in a year of major national elections, including November’s vote in the US. The rise of artificial intelligence adds to the pressure given that the fast-evolving technology makes it quicker and easier to spread misinformation, including through synthetic media, known as deepfakes.

TikTok, which has more than 1 billion global users, has repeatedly promised to step up its efforts to counter misinformation in response to pressure from governments around the world, including the UK and EU. In May, the video-sharing platform committed to becoming the first major social media network to label some AI-generated content automatically.

The false claim about Swift canceling her tour in Florida, which also circulated on X, mirrored an article published in May in the satirical newspaper The Dunning-Kruger Times, although this article was not linked or directly referred to in the TikTok post.

At least 20 people said on a comment thread that they had clicked on the notification and were directed to a video on TikTok repeating the claim, even though they did not follow the account. At least one person in the thread said they initially thought the notification “was a news article.”

Swift is still scheduled to perform three concerts in Miami in October and has not publicly called Florida “racist.”

Another push notification inaccurately stated that a Japanese pitcher who plays for the Los Angeles Dodgers faced a ban from Major League Baseball: “Shohei Ohtani has been BANNED from the MLB for 5 years following his gambling investigation… ”

The words directly matched the description of a post uploaded as an April Fools’ day prank. Tens of commenters on the original video, however, reported receiving alerts in mid-April. Several said they had initially believed it before they checked other sources.

Users have also reported notifications that appeared to contain news updates but were generated weeks after the event.

One user received an alert on January 23 that read: “BREAKING: A tsunami alert has been issued in Japan after a major earthquake.” The notification appeared to refer to a natural disaster warning issued more than three weeks earlier after an earthquake struck Japan’s Noto peninsula on New Year’s Day.

TikTok said it had removed the specific notifications flagged by the FT.

The alerts appear automatically to scrape the descriptions of posts that are receiving, or are likely to receive, high levels of engagement on the viral video app, owned by China’s ByteDance, researchers said. They seem to be tailored to users’ interests, which means that each one is likely to be limited to a small pool of people.

“The way in which those alerts are positioned, it can feel like the platform is speaking directly to [users] and not just a poster,” said Kaitlyn Regehr, an associate professor of digital humanities at University College London.

TikTok declined to reveal how the app determined which videos to promote through notifications, but the sheer volume of personalized content recommendations must be “algorithmically generated,” said Dani Madrid-Morales, co-lead of the University of Sheffield’s Disinformation Research Cluster.

Edelson, who is also co-director of the Cybersecurity for Democracy group, suggested that a responsible push notification algorithm could be weighted towards trusted sources, such as verified publishers or officials. “The question is: Are they choosing a high-traffic thing from an authoritative source?” she said. “Or is this just a high-traffic thing?”

Additional reporting by Hannah Murphy in San Francisco and Cristina Criddle in London.

Push alerts from TikTok include fake news, expired tsunami warning Read More »

Elon Musk’s lawsuit over alleged X ad boycott “a very weak case,” professor says

elon musk x, Features, Policy, x ad boycott / Mike M. / August 10, 2024

Illustration with three pictures of Elon Musk. In two of the photos there are dollar signs over Musk's eyes, in the other photo there are X logos instead. — Aurich Lawson | Getty Images

Antitrust law professors aren’t impressed by Elon Musk’s lawsuit alleging a supposed X advertising boycott amounts to an antitrust violation. Based on the initial complaint filed by Musk’s X Corp., it looks like “a very weak case,” Vanderbilt Law School Associate Dean for Research Rebecca Haw Allensworth told Ars.

“Given how difficult this will be to win, I would call it an unusual strategy,” she said.

The lawsuit against the World Federation of Advertisers (WFA) and several large corporations says that the alleged boycott is “a naked restraint of trade without countervailing benefits to competition or consumers.” The “collective action among competing advertisers to dictate brand safety standards to be applied by social media platforms shortcuts the competitive process and allows the collective views of a group of advertisers with market power to override the interests of consumers,” X claims.

Musk already won a victory of sorts as the WFA yesterday shut down the Global Alliance for Responsible Media (GARM) initiative that is the main subject of X’s allegations. “GARM is a small, not-for-profit initiative, and recent allegations that unfortunately misconstrue its purpose and activities have caused a distraction and significantly drained its resources and finances. GARM therefore is making the difficult decision to discontinue its activities,” the WFA said.

But the GARM shutdown won’t result in Musk’s company obtaining any financial damages unless X also wins in court. The company formerly named Twitter sued in a federal court in Texas, part of the conservative 5th Circuit, a venue that Musk likely believes will be more favorable to him than a court in another state. The District Court judge overseeing the lawsuit is also handling Musk’s case against Media Matters for America, a nonprofit that conducted research on ads being placed next to pro-Nazi content on X.

Texas is one of three states, along with Louisiana and Mississippi, where appeals go to the US Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit. “The 5th Circuit is well known as the most conservative circuit in the country,” Professor Stephen Calkins of Wayne State University Law School told Ars.

“The law here is very unfavorable to X”

Despite the potentially friendly Texas court venue, Musk’s X faces a high legal bar in proving that it was the victim of an illegal boycott.

Allensworth said X must show “that the defendants did actually enter into an agreement—that they had a deal with each other to pull advertising spend from X as a group, not that each brand did it individually to protect their own brand status or make their own statement about Elon Musk. The law here is very unfavorable to X, but the complaint describes a lot of conduct that could support a jury or judge finding an agreement. But it’s a fact question, and we only have half the story.”

A bigger problem for Musk “is that X must show that the boycott harmed competition, not just that it harmed X,” Allensworth said. “The complaint is far from clear on what competition was harmed. A typical boycott will harm competition among the boycotters, but that doesn’t seem to be what the complaint is about. The complaint says the competition that was harmed was between platforms (like X/Twitter and Facebook, for example) but that’s a bit garbled. Again, we may know more as the suit develops.”

There’s one more problem that may be even bigger than the first two, according to Allensworth. Even if X proves there was an explicit agreement to pull advertising and that a boycott harmed competition, the advertisers would have a strong defense under the First Amendment’s right to speech.

“Concerted refusals to deal (boycotts) are not vulnerable to antitrust suit if they are undertaken to make a statement—essentially to engage in speech,” Allensworth explained. “It would seem here like that was the purpose of this boycott (akin to lunch counter boycotts in the ’60s, which were beyond the reach of the antitrust laws). Given that the Supreme Court has only increased First Amendment rights for corporations recently, I think this defense is very strong.”

All of those factors “add up, to me, to a very weak case,” Allensworth told Ars. But she cautions that at this early stage of litigation, “there’s a lot we don’t know; no one can judge a case based on the complaint alone—that’s the point of the adversarial system.”

An X court win wouldn’t force companies to advertise on the platform. But “if somehow they prevail, X could ask for treble damages—three times the revenue they lost because of the boycott,” Allensworth said.

Elon Musk’s lawsuit over alleged X ad boycott “a very weak case,” professor says Read More »

AT&T rebuked over misleading ad for nonexistent satellite phone calling

ast spacemobile, AT&T, at&t satellite calling, Policy, satellite calling / Paul Patrick / August 9, 2024

Remember 5GE? —

AT&T reluctantly adds disclaimer: “Satellite calling is not currently available.”

Jon Brodkin – Aug 9, 2024 8: 36 pm UTC

Enlarge / Screenshot from AT&T commercial featuring Ben Stiller making a satellite call to Jordan Spieth.

AT&T has been told to stop running ads that claim the carrier is already offering cellular coverage from space.

AT&T intends to offer Supplemental Coverage from Space (SCS) and has a deal with AST SpaceMobile, a Starlink competitor that plans a smartphone service from low-Earth-orbit satellites. But AST SpaceMobile’s first batch of five satellites isn’t scheduled to launch until September.

T-Mobile was annoyed by AT&T running an ad indicating that its satellite-to-cellular service was already available, and filed a challenge with the advertising industry’s self-regulatory system run by BBB National Programs. The BBB National Advertising Division (NAD) ruled against AT&T last month and the carrier appealed to the National Advertising Review Board (NARB), which has now also ruled against AT&T.

“It was not disputed that AT&T does not currently offer SCS coverage to its cellular customers… Therefore, the NARB panel recommended that AT&T discontinue the claim that SCS service is presently available to consumers or modify the claim to clearly and conspicuously communicate that SCS is not available at this time,” the NARB said in an announcement yesterday.

AT&T, which is also famous for renaming its 4G service “5GE,” reluctantly agreed to comply with the recommendation and released a new version of the satellite-calling commercial with more specific disclaimers. “AT&T supports NARB’s self-regulatory process and will comply with NARB’s decision… However, we respectfully disagree with NARB’s conclusion recommending that the commercial be discontinued or modified,” AT&T said in its statement on the decision.

The challenged advertisement, titled “Epic Bad Golf Day,” features actor Ben Stiller looking for a golf ball in various remote locations.

“The commercial near the end shows Mr. Stiller having finally caught up with his golf ball in a desert wasteland… He then places a cellular phone call to champion golfer Jordan Spieth, shown standing on a golf green, presumably so that Mr. Spieth can offer golfing advice,” the NARB ruling said. “An image in the commercial shows the call from Mr. Stiller to Mr. Spieth connecting through a satellite relay. Another visual shows Mr. Stiller’s phone stating that it is ‘Making satellite connection.'”

AT&T: Commercial shouldn’t be taken literally

AT&T’s appeal “points to a number of fanciful/ludicrous features of the commercial in Mr. Stiller’s golf ball odyssey to argue that reasonable consumers will not receive a message that satellite service is currently available, but will understand that AT&T is burnishing its brand by pointing to technological features currently under development,” the panel wrote.

T-Mobile countered “that the use of humor does not shield an advertiser from its obligation to ensure that claims are truthful and non-misleading,” and the NARB agreed.

“The panel views the humorous/fanciful nature of Mr. Stiller’s antics as a means of attracting the attention of viewers, but also as a means of emphasizing the utility of SCS technology—allowing for calls to be placed from remote locations not currently accessible to mobile service,” the industry self-regulatory group said. “The humor associated with Mr. Stiller’s golf misadventures does not cancel out the consumer communication that SCS service is currently available. In addition, the panel does not accept AT&T’s argument that the panel’s decision (or NAD’s decision being appealed) will interfere with the use of humor in advertising.”

The ad originally included small text that described the depicted satellite call as a “demonstration of evolving technology.” The text was changed this week to say that “satellite calling is not currently available.”

“Even assuming consumers will read [the disclaimer], one reasonable interpretation of ‘evolving technology’ is that the technology is currently available, albeit expected to improve in the future,” the NARB said.

The original version also had text that said, “the future of help is an AT&T satellite call away.” The NARB concluded that this “statement can be interpreted reasonably as stating that ‘future’ technology has now arrived. The next visual reinforces that message, as it shows Mr. Stiller communicating on a cell phone call while in a remote location, and the accompanying visual states ‘connecting changes everything,’ a message addressing the present, not the future.”

In the updated version of the ad, AT&T changed the text to say that “the future of help will be an AT&T satellite call away.”

AT&T rebuked over misleading ad for nonexistent satellite phone calling Read More »

Dozens injured, pets killed in fires causing Samsung to recall 1.1M stoves

consumer product safety commission, electric range, electric stove, fire hazard, Policy, product safety, samsung / Kris Guyer / August 9, 2024

Only you can prevent cooktop fires —

Samsung is currently offering free knob locks and covers to prevent fires.

Ashley Belanger – Aug 9, 2024 6: 09 pm UTC

Enlarge / US Consumer Product Safety Commission announced a recall of 1.1 million Samsung Slide-in Electric Ranges due to hundreds of reported fires.

After hundreds of reports of fires causing dozens of injuries and several pet deaths, Samsung is recalling more than a million electric stoves sold in the US between 2013 and 2024.

In a press release, the US Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) reported that the voluntary recall was due to “front-mounted knobs” on Samsung’s slide-in electric ranges. The faulty knobs “can be activated by accidental contact by humans or pets, posing a fire hazard”—particularly when people leave objects on the stove.

The stoves impacted by the recall were widely sold in Costco, Home Depot, Best Buy, Lowe’s, and other appliance stores nationwide. Their knobs can be easily triggered by accident, heating up the cooktop and increasing the risks of fires, the CPSC said. Since 2013, Samsung has received “over 300 reports of unintentional activation.” According to the CPSC:

“These ranges have been involved in approximately 250 fires. At least 18 fires caused extensive property damage. Approximately 40 injuries have been reported, eight of which required medical attention, and there have been reports of seven fires involving pet deaths.”

Luckily, there’s an easy solution recently devised that can prevent this safety hazard in homes across America, Samsung said. Customers concerned about unintentional activations can request free knob locks and covers that Samsung confirmed made it much harder to accidentally turn on the stove.

Whereas the problematic electric ranges’ knobs require users to push the knob and turn, “precision knobs” that Samsung rolled out in April introduce a new safety measure that requires users to pinch the knob before pushing and turning knobs to activate the stove.

“A simple pinching motion” releases a pin that otherwise would remain locked and prevent stoves from accidental activation when knobs are unintentionally bumped or perhaps twisted by a young child or knocked around by a pet, Samsung said.

Consumers who bought one of the 30 affected models listed here can contact Samsung online or by phone or email to receive free knob locks and covers and implement this new “pinching” safety measure, even if their warranty is expired. They can also check if their model has been affected here. If the serial number is no longer readable, customers should call or chat online with a Samsung agent.

Once Samsung receives a request for free knob locks and covers, repair kits “should arrive within five business days,” an FAQ said. And customers will receive tracking information once the knob locks and covers ship. Instructions to install will be provided and are also available online.

Until knob locks and covers are installed, customers can continue using their stoves, Samsung said. But the CPSC advised people to “keep children and pets away from the knobs,” “check the range knobs to ensure they are off before leaving the home or going to bed,” and avoid leaving “objects on the range when the range is not in use.”

Additionally, customers with Wi-Fi-enabled ranges can enable notifications in their Samsung SmartThings app to receive alerts when the stove is on.

Samsung noted that parents in particular seemed to appreciate the precision knobs, with one review calling it a “favorite feature,” because “we have two young girls in the house and not having to worry about one of them playing with the knobs and starting the stove… is a huge plus.”

Fire hazards go beyond Samsung—and can be fatal

Samsung’s recall is part of a worrying trend where front-mounted knobs on both gas and electric ranges from many different manufacturers have caused hundreds of fires in the US. In June, the CPSC’s Joint Gas and Electric Range Knob Working Group hosted a meeting with leading stove manufacturers and other stakeholders to confront the industry-wide problem.

During the meeting, the CPSC shared data showing that across 338 incidents between January 1, 2018, and May 30, 2024, stoves from “ten specific manufacturers” were involved in fires causing 31 injuries and two deaths. Additionally, the CPSC had recorded “two other fatal incidents where a range was accidentally turned on when a knob was bumped, but the manufacturer is unknown.”

According to the CPSC, manufacturers were “interested to learn the events that lead to the ranges accidentally activating, including whether pets were involved, unsupervised children were at fault, or there were unusual circumstances.” Companies said the CPSC data would help them “fully understand the issues” and “make sure that reasonable and foreseeable circumstances would be addressed” without impacting compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Samsung attended the meeting, saying that it joined other “major brands across the appliance industry” to “discuss how to revisit knob safety standards for all ranges to address inadvertent activation.”

The working group’s meetings are expected to continue, but a deadline to reconvene approximately a month after the June meeting has since passed without any further discussion.

A few months prior to the meeting, Samsung introduced the precision knobs as a novel solution in its ranges, as well as an additional safety feature now available in “its most premium Bespoke Slide-In electric and gas ranges,” which illuminates the knobs when they’re turned on. This provides a “visual cue when the knobs are activated,” Samsung said.

As manufacturers like Samsung continue to tweak knobs to improve safety, the CPSC this week issued a safety alert warning the public of fire hazards of gas and electric ranges.

The safety notice advises customers to use safety locks and covers to prevent accidental activation, keep kids and pets away from cooktops with front-mounted knobs, and take care when leaning over the stove to avoid bumping into knobs.

For anyone concerned about safety issues with a gas or electric range, the CPSC provides a database to search additional recalls or otherwise recommends contacting manufacturers directly.

“Consumers who have experienced or have concerns about accidental activation of the front-mounted control knobs on their cooktop should immediately contact the manufacturer of the range to ask if there is a solution or remedy available from the manufacturer,” the CPSC safety alert said.

Dozens injured, pets killed in fires causing Samsung to recall 1.1M stoves Read More »

Ad industry initiative abruptly shuts down after lawsuit filed by Elon Musk’s X

Policy / Rejus Almole / August 8, 2024

Lawsuit fallout —

Global Alliance for Responsible Media disputes X lawsuit but stops operations.

Jon Brodkin – Aug 8, 2024 7: 58 pm UTC

Getty Images | SOPA Images

An advertising industry initiative targeted by an Elon Musk lawsuit is “discontinuing” its activities and has deleted the member list from its website.

On Tuesday, Musk’s X Corp. sued the World Federation of Advertisers (WFA) over what X claims is an illegal boycott spearheaded by a WFA initiative called the Global Alliance for Responsible Media (GARM). The WFA isn’t disbanding but is halting GARM’s activities, and the GARM member page now produces a 404 error. An archived version of the page from yesterday shows the initiative members, including X.

X’s antitrust lawsuit has drawn skeptical responses from law professors, who say it will be difficult to prove that companies violated antitrust laws by stopping advertisements. But while X may never obtain financial damages from the advertising group or corporations like CVS and Unilever that it also named as defendants, fighting the lawsuit could be costly.

Business Insider reported on the GARM shutdown today:

The advertising trade group The World Federation of Advertisers told its members on Thursday that it was “discontinuing” activities for its Global Alliance for Responsible Media initiative following an antitrust lawsuit filed by Elon Musk’s X against the company earlier this week.

Stephan Loerke, the CEO of the WFA, wrote in an email to members, seen by Business Insider, that the decision was “not made lightly” but that GARM is a not-for-profit organization with limited resources. Loerke said that the WFA and GARM intended to contest the allegations in X’s suit in court and were confident the outcome of the case would “demonstrate our full adherence to competition rules in all our activities.”

A WFA spokesperson told Ars that the group plans to issue a statement, and we’ll update this article when the statement is available.

The GARM shutdown was also confirmed by a New York Times report. The NYT paraphrased Loerke’s email as saying that “GARM would shut down its operations immediately.”

Group says work is being misrepresented

The WFA was founded in 1953 and is headquartered in Belgium. The WFA started the GARM initiative in 2019. GARM has two full-time staff members, Business Insider wrote. The WFA was also sued by Rumble, the maker of a video platform that is popular with conservatives.

A GARM webpage that was still online today, and which responds to recent criticism, said the group was created “to help the industry address the challenge of illegal or harmful content on digital media platforms and its monetization via advertising.” Members can “use GARM’s resources and information about best practices to learn where their advertising investments go, and to avoid placement next to illegal or harmful content that could damage their brands’ reputation,” the page says.

GARM says it provides “voluntary frameworks” to help brands make advertising decisions and “does not interfere with a member’s decision as to whether or not to invest advertising resources on a particular website or channel.”

“Suggestions that GARM practices may impinge on free speech are a deliberate misrepresentation of GARM’s work. GARM is not a watchdog or lobby. GARM does not participate in or advocate for boycotts of any kind,” the group says.

X has had an on-again, off-again relationship with GARM. Musk’s social network rejoined GARM little more than a month ago, but the reunion didn’t last long. “X is committed to the safety of our global town square and proud to be part of the GARM community!” X wrote on July 1.

House Republicans celebrate

GARM has also faced attacks from congressional Republicans. The House Judiciary Committee issued a report last month claiming that “the extent to which GARM has organized its trade association and coordinates actions that rob consumers of choices is likely illegal under the antitrust laws and threatens fundamental American freedoms.”

Today, the House Judiciary GOP’s official account on X called GARM being discontinued a “big win for the First Amendment” and a “big win for oversight.” X CEO Linda Yaccarino also applauded the news.

“No small group should be able to monopolize what gets monetized,” she wrote. “This is an important acknowledgement and a necessary step in the right direction. I am hopeful that it means ecosystem-wide reform is coming.”

X’s lawsuit against the WFA objected to GARM’s attempt to enforce “brand safety standards.”

“This is an antitrust action relating to a group boycott by competing advertisers of one of the most popular social media platforms in the United States… Concerned that Twitter might deviate from certain brand safety standards for advertising on social media platforms set through GARM, the conspirators collectively acted to enforce Twitter’s adherence to those standards through the boycott,” X’s lawsuit said.

An advertising industry watchdog group called the Check My Ads Institute predicted that X will only lose more advertisers after the lawsuit and its fallout.

“The reality is today’s decision [by GARM] means even more advertisers will flee X, and quickly so they’re not targeted in the future. Everyone can see that advertising on X is a treacherous business relationship for advertisers,” Check My Ads co-founder Claire Atkin said in a statement emailed to reporters.

Ad industry initiative abruptly shuts down after lawsuit filed by Elon Musk’s X Read More »

Amazon defends $4B Anthropic AI deal from UK monopoly concerns

AI, ai industry, Amazon, Anthropic, anti-competition, cma, competition and markets authority, competition law, foundational models, Policy / Rejus Almole / August 8, 2024

The United Kingdom’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has officially launched a probe into Amazon’s $4 billion partnership with the AI firm Anthropic, as it continues to monitor how the largest tech companies might seize control of AI to further entrench their dominant market positions.

Through the partnership, “Amazon will become Anthropic’s primary cloud provider for certain workloads, including agreements for purchasing computing capacity and non-exclusive commitments to make Anthropic models available on Amazon Bedrock,” the CMA said.

Amazon and Anthropic deny there’s anything wrong with the deal. But because the CMA has seen “some” foundational model (FM) developers “form partnerships with major cloud providers” to “secure access to compute” needed to develop models, the CMA is worried that “incumbent firms” like Amazon “could use control over access to compute to shape FM-related markets in their own interests.”

Due to this potential risk, the CMA said it is “considering” whether Amazon’s partnership with Anthropic “has resulted in the creation of a relevant merger situation under the merger provisions of the Enterprise Act 2002 and, if so, whether the creation of that situation has resulted, or may be expected to result, in a substantial lessening of competition within any market or markets” in the UK.

It’s not clear yet if Amazon’s partnership with Anthropic is problematic, but the CMA confirmed that after a comment period last April, it now has “sufficient information” to kick off this first phase of its merger investigation.

By October 4, this first phase will conclude, after which the CMA may find that the partnership does not qualify as a merger situation, the UK regulator said. Or it may determine that it is a merger situation “but does not raise competition concerns,” clearing Amazon to proceed with the deal.

However, if a merger situation exists, and “it may result in a substantial lessening of competition” in a UK market, the CMA may refer the investigation to the next phase, allowing a panel of independent experts to dig deeper to illuminate potential risks and concerns. If Amazon wants to avoid that deeper probe potentially ordering steep fines, the tech giant would then have the option to offer fixes to “resolve the CMA’s concerns,” the CMA said.

An Amazon spokesperson told Reuters that its “collaboration with Anthropic does not raise any competition concerns or meet the CMA’s own threshold for review.”

“Amazon holds no board seat nor decision-making power at Anthropic, and Anthropic is free to work with any other provider (and indeed has multiple partners),” Amazon’s spokesperson said, defending the deal.

Anthropic’s spokesperson agreed that nothing was amiss, telling Reuters that “our strategic partnerships and investor relationships do not diminish our corporate governance independence or our freedom to partner with others. We intend to cooperate with the CMA and provide them with a comprehensive understanding of Amazon’s investment and our commercial collaboration.”

Amazon defends $4B Anthropic AI deal from UK monopoly concerns Read More »

All the possible ways to destroy Google’s monopoly in search

android, antitrust, Antitrust law, Apple, Bing, chrome, department of justice, duckduckgo, Features, Google, google monopoly, microsoft, mozilla, online search, online search industry, Policy, samsung / Paul Patrick / August 7, 2024

After US District Judge Amit Mehta ruled that Google has a monopoly in two markets—general search services and general text advertising—everybody is wondering how Google might be forced to change its search business.

Specifically, the judge ruled that Google’s exclusive deals with browser and device developers secured Google’s monopoly. These so-called default agreements funneled the majority of online searches to Google search engine result pages (SERPs), where results could be found among text ads that have long generated the bulk of Google’s revenue.

At trial, Mehta’s ruling noted, it was estimated that if Google lost its most important default deal with Apple, Google “would lose around 65 percent of its revenue, even assuming that it could retain some users without the Safari default.”

Experts told Ars that disrupting these default deals is the most obvious remedy that the US Department of Justice will seek to restore competition in online search. Other remedies that may be sought range from least painful for Google (mandating choice screens in browsers and devices) to most painful (requiring Google to divest from either Chrome or Android, where it was found to be self-preferencing).

But the remedies phase of litigation may have to wait until after Google’s appeal, which experts said could take years to litigate before any remedies are ever proposed in court. Whether Google could be successful in appealing the ruling is currently being debated, with anti-monopoly advocates backing Mehta’s ruling as “rock solid” and critics suggesting that the ruling’s fresh takes on antitrust law are open to attack.

Google declined Ars’ request to comment on appropriate remedies or its plan to appeal.

Previously, Google’s president of global affairs, Kent Walker, confirmed in a statement that the tech giant would be appealing the ruling because the court found that “Google is ‘the industry’s highest quality search engine, which has earned Google the trust of hundreds of millions of daily users,’ that Google ‘has long been the best search engine, particularly on mobile devices,’ ‘has continued to innovate in search,’ and that ‘Apple and Mozilla occasionally assess Google’s search quality relative to its rivals and find Google’s to be superior.'”

“Given this, and that people are increasingly looking for information in more and more ways, we plan to appeal,” Walker said. “As this process continues, we will remain focused on making products that people find helpful and easy to use.”

But Mehta found that Google was wielding its outsize influence in the search industry to block rivals from competing by locking browsers and devices into agreements ensuring that all searches went to Google SERPs. None of the pro-competitive benefits that Google claimed justified the exclusive deals persuaded Mehta, who ruled that “importantly,” Google “exercised its monopoly power by charging supra-competitive prices for general search text ads”—and thus earned “monopoly profits.”

While experts think the appeal process will delay litigation on remedies, Google seems to think that Mehta may rule on potential remedies before Google can proceed with its appeal. Walker told Google employees that a ruling on remedies may arrive in the next few months, The Wall Street Journal reported. Ars will continue monitoring for updates on this timeline.

As the DOJ’s case against Google’s search business has dragged on, reports have long suggested that a loss for Google could change the way that nearly the entire world searches the Internet.

Adam Epstein—the president and co-CEO of adMarketplace, which bills itself as “the largest consumer search technology company outside of Google and Bing”—told Ars that innovations in search could result in a broader landscape of more dynamic search experiences that draw from sources beyond Google and allow searchers to skip Google’s SERPs entirely. If that happens, the coming years could make Google’s ubiquitous search experience today a distant memory.

“By the end of this decade, going to a search engine results page will seem quaint,” Epstein predicted. “The court’s decision sets the stage for a remedy that will dramatically improve the search experience for everyone connected to the web. The era of innovation in search is just around the corner.”

The DOJ has not meaningfully discussed potential remedies it will seek, but Jonathan Kanter, assistant attorney general of the Justice Department’s antitrust division, celebrated the ruling.

“This landmark decision holds Google accountable,” Kanter said. “It paves the path for innovation for generations to come and protects access to information for all Americans.”

All the possible ways to destroy Google’s monopoly in search Read More »

Microsoft says Delta’s ancient IT explains long outage after CrowdStrike snafu

delta crowdstrike, microsoft crowdstrike, Policy / Paul Patrick / August 7, 2024

Your bad —

“Delta, unlike its competitors… has not modernized its IT infrastructure.”

Jon Brodkin – Aug 7, 2024 4: 18 pm UTC

Delta Air Lines customers looking for missing bags wait in line in an airport baggage claim area. — Enlarge / Delta Air Lines customers looking for missing bags wait in line at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) on July 24, 2024.

Getty Images | Patrick T. Fallon

Microsoft says that Delta Air Lines’ ancient IT infrastructure is to blame for the airline’s inability to quickly recover from last month’s CrowdStrike debacle.

With Delta threatening to sue Microsoft and CrowdStrike, both companies issued responses saying that Delta refused repeated calls for help. A Microsoft letter to Delta yesterday said the Windows maker is starting to figure out why Delta took longer than other airlines to recover.

“Microsoft continues to investigate the circumstances surrounding the CrowdStrike incident to understand why other airlines were able to fully restore business operations so much faster than Delta, including American Airlines and United Airlines,” the letter from Microsoft attorney Mark Cheffo said. “Our preliminary review suggests that Delta, unlike its competitors, apparently has not modernized its IT infrastructure, either for the benefit of its customers or for its pilots and flight attendants.”

On July 19, a faulty update from security firm CrowdStrike crashed millions of Windows PCs. In a July 29 letter, Delta attorney David Boies said the airline has “reason to believe Microsoft has failed to comply with contractual requirements and otherwise acted in a grossly negligent, indeed willful, manner in connection with the Faulty Update,” according to CNBC.

Cheffo’s response to Boies said that “Microsoft empathizes with Delta and its customers regarding the impact of the CrowdStrike incident.” But the Boies letter “and Delta’s public comments are incomplete, false, misleading, and damaging to Microsoft and its reputation,” Cheffo wrote.

“Given Delta’s false and damaging public statements, Microsoft will vigorously defend itself in any litigation if Delta chooses to pursue that path,” Cheffo wrote. The letter demanded that Delta preserve documents related to the outage.

Delta allegedly refused offers to help

CrowdStrike previously wrote to Delta on Sunday. “CrowdStrike’s CEO personally reached out to Delta’s CEO to offer onsite assistance, but received no response. CrowdStrike followed up with Delta on the offer for onsite support and was told that the onsite resources were not needed,” the letter said.

Microsoft’s letter on Tuesday provided a similar description. “Even though Microsoft’s software had not caused the CrowdStrike incident, Microsoft immediately jumped in and offered to assist Delta at no charge following the July 19 outage,” the letter said. “Each day that followed from July 19 through July 23, Microsoft employees repeated their offers to help Delta. Each time, Delta turned down Microsoft’s offers to help, even though Microsoft would not have charged Delta for this assistance.”

The letter said that after one Microsoft outreach on July 22, a “Delta employee replied, saying ‘all good. Cool will let you know and thank you.’ Despite this assessment that things were ‘all good,’ public reports indicate that Delta canceled more than 1,100 flights on July 22 and more than 500 flights on July 23.”

Senior executives repeatedly reached out to Delta executives “with similar results,” the letter said. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella emailed Delta CEO Ed Bastian on July 24, but Bastian never replied, according to the letter.

Microsoft says it has a pretty good idea of why Delta refused its help. “In fact, it is rapidly becoming apparent that Delta likely refused Microsoft’s help because the IT system it was most having trouble restoring—its crew-tracking and scheduling system—was being serviced by other technology providers, such as IBM, because it runs on those providers’ systems, and not Microsoft Windows or Azure,” the letter said.

We contacted Delta today and will update this article if the company provides a response.

Microsoft says Delta’s ancient IT explains long outage after CrowdStrike snafu Read More »