SCOTUS Hears Landmark Lawsuit to Remove Legal Protections for Internet Giants

The US Supreme Court heard arguments Tuesday in a landmark case that could transform the Internet by removing decades-old legal protections for technology companies.

During oral arguments, the justices expressed uncertainty about whether to lower the legal shield that protects Internet companies from a wide range of lawsuits, and at times seemed confused about some of the underlying issues.

‘We are a court, we really don’t know about these things. You know, these are not like the top nine Internet experts,” Judge Elena Kagan said of her and her colleagues, drawing laughter from the gallery and smiles from others on the bench.

The case stems from the death of American college student Nohemi González in a 2015 Paris terror attack, after which her family sued Google-owned YouTube for allegedly allowing videos that helped ISIS spread its message and recruit.

Google claims that a 1996 law, Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, gives Twitter, Facebook and other online companies far-reaching immunity from lawsuits over user-posted content.

The judges repeatedly expressed confusion during Tuesday’s hearing, with Judge Samuel Alito at one point telling Google’s lawyer he was “completely confused by whatever argument I’m making at this time.”

Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson also admitted to being “completely confused” during the arguments, which she said had strayed from the scope of the legal issues being considered.

Nohemi was a 23-year-old student at California State University, Long Beach, studying abroad in France when suicide bombers and ISIS gunmen carried out a coordinated attack on entertainment venues and restaurants, killing 130 people.

The lawsuit filed by his family highlighted the tension between the technology politics created a generation ago, at the dawn of the Internet, and the reach of today’s social networks, which add up to billions of posts every day.

The San Francisco-based US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit relied on Section 230 to dismiss the lawsuit, which is now on final appeal to the Supreme Court.

The lawsuit accused Google of providing “material support” to terrorism and claimed that YouTube, through the video-sharing platform’s computer algorithms, illegally recommended ISIS videos to certain users.

The video tips helped spread the Islamic State message and recruit jihadist fighters, the lawsuit says.

The judges noted their concern about the potential consequences of limiting immunity for internet companies and the difficulty of figuring out where to draw that line while expressing skepticism that these companies should protect themselves from certain types of harmful or defamatory content.

Judge Kagan said that Congress, not the court, should make the necessary changes to Section 230.

Justice Brett Kavanaugh, one of the six conservatives, sided with his liberal colleague in a case that appeared to cross ideological lines.

“Isn’t it better,” Kavanaugh asked, to keep things as they are and “put the burden on Congress to change that?”

The judges used a variety of examples to investigate what YouTube does when it uses computer algorithms to recommend videos to viewers, whether it’s content produced by terrorists or cat lovers.

Chief Justice John Roberts suggested that what YouTube is doing is not “presenting anything in particular to the person who made the request” but just a “21st century version” of what has been going on for a long time. , gathering a group of things. the person may want to look.

Judge Clarence Thomas asked if YouTube uses the same algorithm to recommend rice pilaf recipes and terrorist content. Yes, he was told.

Kagan noted that “every time someone looks at something on the internet, there’s an algorithm involved,” whether it’s a Google search, YouTube or Twitter.

He asked Gonzalez family attorney Eric Schnapper if agreeing with him would ultimately make Section 230 meaningless.

Schnapper said no, adding: ‘As you say, algorithms are ubiquitous. But the question is: ‘What does the defendant do with the algorithm?’

Lower courts have broadly interpreted Section 230 to protect the industry, which the companies and their allies say has fueled the meteoric growth of the Internet by shielding companies from lawsuits over user posts and encouraging the removal of harmful content. .

But critics argue that companies have not done enough to police and moderate content and that the law should not block lawsuits over recommendations that direct viewers to more material that interests them and keeps them online longer.

Any reduction in your immunity could have dramatic consequences that could affect every corner of the internet because websites use algorithms to sort through and filter a mountain of data.

Lisa Blatt, representing Google, told the court that the recommendations are just a way to organize all that information. YouTube users watch a billion hours of video a day and upload 500 hours of video every minute, Blatt said.

However, Roberts was among several judges who questioned Blatt about whether YouTube should have the same legal protection for its recommendations as it does for hosting videos.

‘They appear according to the algorithms that their clients have. And those algorithms must be directed at something. And that guidance, I think, is called a recommendation, and that’s from Google. That is not the provider of the underlying information,” Roberts said.

Reflecting the complexity of the issue and the apparent caution of the court, Judge Neil Gorsuch suggested another factor in the recommendations made by YouTube and others, noting that “most algorithms these days are designed to maximize profit.”

Gorsuch suggested that the court could send the case back to a lower court without assessing the extent of Google’s legal protections. He participated in discussions over the phone because he was “a little bit off,” Roberts said.

Several other justices indicated that the arguments in a related case on Wednesday could provide an avenue around the tough questions posed Tuesday.

The court will hear about another terror attack, on a nightclub in Istanbul in 2017 that killed 39 people and sparked a lawsuit against Twitter, Facebook and Google.

Separate challenges to social media laws enacted by Republicans in Florida and Texas are pending before the high court, but they won’t be discussed before the fall or decided until the first half of 2024.