Last Updated March 2024
In a decision on March 6, 2024 by the European Union General Court, Puma lost its Community design registration for the Creeper sneaker because images of the design were posted on Rihanna's Instagram over a year before Puma applied for registration, thereby invalidating the design due to prior public disclosure.
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Last Updated March 2024
According to the American Sociological Association, online content has become instrumental in modern legal cases. One case study showed that 64% of judges used social media evidence to support “not guilty” verdicts in sexual harassment cases. Another study showed that out of 198 gang indictments involving social media evidence, 190 led to convictions. Not only is social media prominent in criminal cases, but also plays a critical role in civil cases. The fact that online content is such a major focus in modern legal cases should come as no surprise, as Pew Research estimates that about 70% of all Americans today use social media. Often, attorneys on both sides of a case race against one another to find, record, and file digital evidence. This is why timely capturing is so critical in the modern legal world.
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Last Updated April 2024
Though it may seem contradictory, information on the web is both fleeting and permanent, unchangeable yet frequently and easily altered. The internet is filled with countless dormant websites and web pages that have not welcomed any traffic or modifications for years. Active pages may change from day to day with text and images tweaked, added, removed, or revised due to changing marketing priorities and search engine optimization – or for more nefarious reasons. However, the historical yet no longer active online content lives on.
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Last Updated March 2024
In today’s fast-paced digital world, where information is easily accessible with a few taps or clicks, it is important to confirm the reliability of the evidence. Unfortunately, digital evidence is especially susceptible to some types of manipulation, so it is important to ensure its validity using appropriate methods. In the practice of law, choosing the right authentication methods can impact the reliability and credibility of evidence presented in court, whether digital or tangible in nature.
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Last Updated March 2024
Per the Federal Rules of Evidence 901 (FRE 901), online evidence requires authentication for admissibility in court. Authentication involves crucial capture details like time, browser, hash values, and metadata. Attorneys often had to provide their own affidavits or testify in court in the past, yet courts still excluded evidence due to inadequate certifications or affidavits. Consequently, law firms faced challenges authenticating web content, either through complex in-house processes or outsourcing leading to slow turnaround times and even missed evidence.
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Last Updated March 2024
As legal teams address the myriad aspects of a case, it can be easy to overlook the importance of securely capturing and preserving digital content, such as websites, social media sites, and online videos. After all, the evidence is publicly available, and even if it gets removed, there are tools such as the Internet Archive (also known as the Wayback Machine) that can demonstrate what a site looked like in the past – right?
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