June 2015 – TCPA Watch

Sixth Circuit Limits Scope of “Unsolicited Advertisement” under the TCPA

Jun 24 2015

By Joseph C. Wylie II, Molly K. McGinley, and Nicole C. Mueller

The Sixth Circuit recently held that a facsimile which lacks commercial components on its face does not constitute an advertisement under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act and ruled that the possibility of remote economic benefit to a defendant is “legally irrelevant” to determining whether the fax violates the TCPA. The Sixth Circuit’s narrow rule stands out among decisions from other courts that have adopted an expansive interpretation of “advertisement” under the TCPA, and demonstrates that the scope of the TCPA is indeed subject to limitations. Read More

FCC Empowers TCPA Plaintiffs At Peril Of Businesses

Jun 19 2015

As originally published in Law360

By Martin L. Stern, Andrew C. Glass, Gregory N. Blase and Joseph C. Wylie

At its June 18, 2015, open meeting, a sharply divided Federal Communications Commission made good on Chairman Tom Wheeler’s recent promise to bolster the Telephone Consumer Protection Act’s already strict rules and to bring about “one of the most significant FCC consumer protection actions since it established the Do-Not-Call Registry with the FTC in 2003.” While plaintiffs’ class action lawyers are likely to applaud the new measures, businesses are concerned that the new rules could unfairly restrict legitimate communications with customers.

Congress enacted the TCPA in 1991 to address what it perceived as the growing problem of unsolicited telemarketing with technologies such as fax machines, pre-recorded voice messages and automatic dialing systems. The TCPA requires anyone making a call to a wireless line using autodialer or pre-recorded voice-call technologies to obtain the “called party’s” “prior express consent,” and, following a 2012 FCC decision, “prior express written consent” for calls that introduce advertising or constitute telemarketing. Similarly, under that ruling, calls to residential lines using an artificial/pre-recorded voice that introduce advertising or constitute telemarketing require the called party’s prior express written consent. Read More

European Court of Human Rights Rules Company Liable for Offensive User-Generated Comments

Jun 17 2015

By Ignasi Guardans

On Monday, the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ruled that an Estonian commercially-run Internet news portal was liable for the offensive online comments of its readers. This was the first case in which the court had been called upon to examine a complaint about liability for user-generated comments on an Internet news portal.

In its grand chamber judgment in the case of Delfi AS v. Estonia (application no. 64569/09), the ECHR held, by 15 votes to two, that there had been no violation of Article 10 (freedom of expression) of the European Convention on Human Rights.

The ECHR has a final say, above any other national jurisdiction, on matters related to the European Convention on Human Rights and its judgments have a huge influence in courts all across the Continent. Read More

EC Digital Single Market Strategy — Details Emerge

Jun 11 2015

By Ignasi Guardans, Etienne Drouard, and Annette Mutschler-Siebert

As we recently reported and covered in a webinar, on May 6, the European Commission released the EU’s Digital Single Market strategy, with the declared objective to tear down the obstacles to doing business online. The DSM Strategy has been released together with a document intended to provide the “Analysis and Evidence” supporting it.

The DSM Strategy will create potential major challenges as well as opportunities for almost every company doing business in the EU.

Archive:June 2015