Features

Supreme Court Narrowly Interprets CFAA to Avoid Criminalizing 'Commonplace Computer Activity'
The Court held that only those who obtain information from particular areas of the computer which they are not authorized to access can be said to "exceed authorization."
Features

U.S. Supreme Court Largely Upholds IPR Proceedings In 'Arthrex'
In a decision authored by Chief Justice Roberts, the Supreme Court ruled that the statutory scheme appointing PTAB administrative patent judges (APJs) to adjudicate IPRs violates the appointments clause of the U.S. Constitution.
Features

Fifth Amendment Protection of Cellphone Passwords Remains Murky As Supreme Court Declines to Weigh In
When law enforcement seeks to compel a subject to provide a passcode to allow them to rummage through a cellphone, courts have not spoken with a unified voice. Some, including New Jersey's highest court, have arrived at the dubious conclusion that requiring an individual to communicate cellphone passcodes to the government does not warrant Fifth Amendment protection. Commentators had hoped that the U.S. Supreme Court would reject that expansive view, however, the Supreme Court declined to wade in, seemingly guaranteeing that continued uncertainty on this critical issue will continue to bedevil criminal practitioners.
Features

Supreme Court on APIs and Fair Use
Google didn't get an answer from the U.S. Supreme Court on whether the Java Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) it copied from Sun Microsystems were copyrightable. But it got just about everything else it could have hoped for in a decision that ended its 11-year copyright clash with Sun's successor, Oracle.
Features

Supreme Court Leaves As Many Questions As It Answers In 'Google v. Oracle'
The Court cleared Google of copyright infringement in terminating a 16-year long dispute as to whether Google's Android mobile platform had infringed Oracle's Java programming language's copyright. However, the Court did not answer the question of whether specific components of computer software qualifies for copyright protection at all.
Features

U.S. Supreme Court Allows Repossessing Secured Lender to Hold Collateral Pending Bankruptcy Stay
A secured lender's "mere retention of property [after a pre-bankruptcy–repossession] does not violate" the automatic stay provision of the Bankruptcy Code, held a unanimous U.S. Supreme Court in City of Chicago v. Fulton.
Features

Not-So-Incidental Byproducts of 'Kelly'
Early returns are in, and they indicate that the Supreme Court's decision in the so-called "Bridgegate" case will be an effective tool for pruning the wild overgrowth that has built up around the federal fraud statutes.
Features

Implications of a More Conservative Supreme Court for White-Collar Practitioners
A review of recent decisions of the Roberts court and of decisions in which Barrett participated during her limited tenure on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit provides some hints regarding how the Supreme Court's future decisions may affect the law relevant to white-collar criminal practice.
Features

Testing for Genericness After USPTO v. Booking.com
In the recent U.S. Supreme Court case of USPTO v. Booking.com, the U.S. Supreme Court held that the term Booking.com is not necessarily generic merely because it is composed of two components, each itself generic. In so deciding, Justice Ginsburg averred that there is an appropriate metric to determine if such a term is indeed generic, that of consumer perception.
Features

Alice and Incongruity In PTAB Appeals
This article discusses the significant contrast between consideration of issues related to the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Alice Corp. v. CLS Int'l in prosecution and their resolution by the PTAB.
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