notifications – Techdirt (original) (raw)

India’s Government Goes After Apple For Notifying Journalists, Dissidents Of Phone Hacking Attempts

from the overplaying-its-hand-a-bit dept

Israeli malware developer NSO Group found itself the subject of international headlines a couple of years ago. Not the good kind either. A leaked document apparently showed who was being targeted by the company’s cell phone exploits — a long, disturbing list that contained journalists, lawyers, activists, dissidents, religious leaders, and plenty of politicians.

The months following that initial leak have been even less kind to NSO. To be fair, NSO deserved every bit of this backlash since it had spent several years courting the business of some of the most abusive governments in the world.

NSO is pretty much out of the malware business at the moment, but even if it chooses to get back at it, it will be an extremely uphill battle. It’s been sanctioned, sued, and the subject of multiple investigations by governments apparently shocked to discover they themselves have been maliciously deploying malicious software.

India is one of several countries to open an investigation into NSO and possible use of its phone exploits. This investigation was actually opened by the nation’s top court, which has already been told by the Modi government that it’s not interested in cooperating with the Supreme Court’s inquiry. And the government still wants surveillance tech to (presumably) abuse. But, for the moment, it’s not interested in purchasing it from NSO Group.

Factoring into this latest news is a move Apple made after these revelations about NSO. It sued NSO towards the end of 2021 — a lawsuit that came with a new notification program attached. Apple stated it would notify any users it suspected to be targeted by state-sponsored hacking attempts. It made good on this promise almost immediately, notifying a Polish prosecutor that their phone had been subjected to hacking attempts. Many more notifications soon followed, with the company notifying victims in Thailand, El Salvador, and Uganda.

All of that has added up to this: the government of India being super-pissed Apple is letting people know state-sponsored hackers are trying to access their devices. Gerry Shih and Joseph Menn, reporting for the Washington Post, have the details:

A day after Apple warned independent Indian journalists and opposition party politicians in October that government hackers may have tried to break into their iPhones, officials under Prime Minister Narendra Modi promptly took action — against Apple.

Officials from the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) publicly questioned whether the Silicon Valley company’s internal threat algorithms were faulty and announced an investigation into the security of Apple devices.

Understandably, it’s embarrassing getting caught doing the sorts of things people already suspect you of doing. But rather than say something useful — like the government will be looking into this to see if this is a misuse of the tech — the Modi government chose to accuse Apple of being incompetent and place it under investigation instead.

According to anonymous Modi administration officials, the government is placing a ton of pressure on Apple’s India reps to come up with an alternative to the notification program and/or the notifications themselves. Apparently, the government believes the notifications are having a negative “political impact.” Again, rather than alter its tactics, it’s pressuring Apple India reps to alter theirs. They’re seeking alternative wording that might suggest the Modi government has a better reason for hacking phones than simply to spy on people who aren’t fans of Modi or his administration.

That’s going to be a tough sell. The facts speak for themselves.

Many of the more than 20 people who received Apple’s warnings at the end of October have been publicly critical of Modi or his longtime ally, Gautam Adani, an Indian energy and infrastructure tycoon.

Things look even worse when you take a look at which journalists were apparently targeted by state-sponsored hacking:

Of the journalists who received notifications, two stood out: Anand Mangnale and Ravi Nair of the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, a nonprofit alliance of dozens of independent, investigative newsrooms from around the world.

If the Modi administration wanted to draw attention away from its abusive tactics and alleged corruption, it couldn’t have picked a worse way to do it. Thanks to Apple’s notification program, the entire world now has a clearer picture of how (and why) the Indian government deploys phone exploits. And the malware detected on Mangnale’s phone was none other than NSO Group’s flagship product: Pegasus.

NSO did respond to requests for comment from the Washington Post, but as usual, its contribution to the discussion was less than useful. Once again, NSO stressed it only sells to governments and only for the purposes of combating terrorism and “major crimes.” But this part of the statement is even more useless than the usual stuff NSO says when yet another report shows even more abusive deployments of its spyware.

“The company’s policies and contracts provide mechanisms to avoid targeting of journalists, lawyers and human rights defenders or political dissidents that are not involved in terror or serious crimes.”

“Provide” all the “mechanisms” you want, but it doesn’t actually prevent anyone from targeting the kind of people who shouldn’t be targeted by governments that bought malware and agreed to use it to fight terrorism and “major crime.” The correct response would be to terminate contracts and refuse to sell to governments caught abusing the tech. The incorrect response would be… well, pretty much everything NSO has done since the leak blew the lid off its plausible deniability.

It’s pretty easy to tell a powerful foreign government to fuck off from Cupertino, California. But things are far less simple for those having to deal with Indian government officials face-to-face. The Apple reps located in India appear to have been intimidated into at least some level of cooperation with the government’s preferred narrative.

Apple India soon sent out emails observing that it could have made mistakes and that “detecting such attacks relies on threat intelligence signals that are often imperfect and incomplete.”

But that appears to be the end of the concessions being made by Apple India. And Apple, for its part, flew an outside rep to India to meet with the government in an effort to disabuse it of its (clearly false) notions that Apple hacking warnings are generally just the result of incompetence by Apple’s security team.

For now, it appears the Modi administration believes it has won this match. Pressure to alter notifications has eased a bit as the government’s narrative is continually pushed by politicians who insist the notices were nothing but mistakes or, as one legislator put it, “fake” (as in news). The Indian government can try to enjoy this non-victory, but it’s still losing the long game. India’s citizens already know they can’t trust this government. This is just more evidence indicating the distrust is genuine and earned.

Filed Under: bjp, india, journalism, journalists, malware, narendra modi, notifications, spyware, state sponsored hacking, surveillance
Companies: apple

Letter From Sen. Wyden To The DOJ Says Governments Are Gathering Push Notification Data From Google, Apple

from the just-another-way-to-collect-it-all dept

If nothing else, Senator Ron Wyden is keeping us on top of the surveillance curve. The privacy-focused senator has asked more uncomfortable questions of more federal agencies than anyone since the Church Committee.

Sometimes it’s new stuff. Sometimes it’s stuff that’s been around for years, but no one bothered to question it until Wyden. Sometimes it’s stuff like this — stuff that seems more like opportunism than a smart new form of intelligence gathering.

If you want data, you go to where the data is. National security agencies collect and store plenty of data, but other governments aren’t allowed to just go rooting through other governments’ virtual file cabinets.

No, the biggest collectors of data are tech companies. Anything that can be collected almost always is collected. Google stands astride multiple data streams, including (apparently) information generated by push notifications sent to Android phones. The same thing can be said about Apple, even though it has taken a few more proactive steps to limit data-gathering and doesn’t have anywhere near the (data) market share Google has, what with its massive suite of ubiquitous services, all capable of gathering vast amounts of info.

So, what’s the (latest) problem? Well, it looks like foreign governments have figured out Google and Apple have another trove of data they can tap, as Raphael Satter reports for Reuters:

Unidentified governments are surveilling smartphone users via their apps’ push notifications, a U.S. senator warned on Wednesday.

In a letter to the Department of Justice, Senator Ron Wyden said foreign officials were demanding the data from Alphabet’s (GOOGL.O) Google and Apple (AAPL.O). Although details were sparse, the letter lays out yet another path by which governments can track smartphones.

Add that to the list that includes metadata from nearly every internet-based communication, location data gathered by Google/Apple directly or by third-party apps, keywords used by search engine users, etc. Now, there’s this: governments gathering push notification data from Apple and Google just because they can.

Wyden’s letter [PDF] suggests it’s only foreign governments doing this, at least for the moment. (Or at least as far as he knows…)

In the spring of 2022, my office received a tip that government agencies in foreign countries were demanding smartphone “push” notification records from Google and Apple. My staff have been investigating this tip for the past year, which included contacting Apple and Google. In response to that query, the companies told my staff that information about this practice is restricted from public release by the government.

Check out that last sentence. Which government could forbid US companies from releasing information about these data requests? That’s the key sentence. That’s why Wyden is asking the DOJ one question, while informing the public there’s a more direct question he could be asking instead.

This is made even more explicit in the next paragraph of Wyden’s letter:

Apple and Google should be permitted to be transparent about the legal demands they receive, particularly from foreign governments, just as the companies regularly notify users about other types of government demands for data. These companies should be permitted to generally reveal whether they have been compelled to facilitate this surveillance practice, to publish aggregate statistics about the number of demands they receive, and unless temporarily gagged by a court, to notify specific customers about demands for their data. I would ask that the DOJ repeal or modify any policies that impede this transparency.

This strongly suggests it’s domestic demands for push notification data that has kept this under wraps. Wyden’s request that the DOJ modify any policies demanding blanket secrecy be rescinded makes it clear he knows more than he’s willing to state in a public letter to the DOJ.

There is absolutely no doubt in my mind DOJ components are demanding this data and demanding these companies not talk about it. There’s simply no way only foreign governments have access to this data. And they certainly don’t have the legal reach to demand eternal silence. But the DOJ does. And if DOJ components are doing it, there’s a good chance other federal agencies are doing the same thing.

Wyden’s letter has provoked at least one useful response, as Satter reports for Reuters:

In a statement, Apple said that Wyden’s letter gave them the opening they needed to share more details with the public about how governments monitored push notifications.

“In this case, the federal government prohibited us from sharing any information,” the company said in a statement. “Now that this method has become public we are updating our transparency reporting to detail these kinds of requests.”

Google said that it shared Wyden’s “commitment to keeping users informed about these requests.”

If it’s now public knowledge (thanks to this letter), these companies can now start telling the public about these data demands. And that may have been the point of Wyden’s letter: freeing up Google and Apple to detail requests for push notification data without having to raise a ton of legal challenges before some court finally decides they actually have standing to challenge these requests.

And if that was Wyden’s intent, it was handled beautifully. It starts with the misdirection of expressing concern about snooping by foreign governments before twisting it the other way to suggest (without ever directly saying so) that the DOJ is doing the same thing and swearing Apple and Google to silence. But now that it’s out, these companies are no longer required to pretend it isn’t happening.

Filed Under: doj, notifications, privacy, push notifications, ron wyden, surveillance
Companies: apple, google

Twitter About To Be Hit With A ~$250 Million Fine For Using Your Two Factor Authentication Phone Numbers/Emails For Marketing

from the good dept

There are many things that big internet companies do that the media have made out to be scandals that aren’t — but one misuse of data that I think received too little attention was how both Facebook and later Twitter were caught using the phone numbers people gave it for two factor authentication, and later used them for notification/marketing purposes.

In case you’re somehow unaware, two-factor authentication is how you should protect your most important accounts. I know many people are too lazy to set it up, but please do so. It’s not perfect (Twitter’s recent big hack routed around 2FA protections), but it is many times better than just relying on a username and password. In the early days of 2FA, one common way to implement it was to use text messaging as the second factor. That is, when you tried to login on a new machine (or after a certain interval of time), the service would have to text you a code that you would need to enter to prove that you were you.

Over time, people realized that this method was less secure. Many hacks involved people “SIM swapping” (using social engineering to have your phone number ported over to them), and then getting the 2FA code sent to the hacker. These days, good 2FA usually involves using an authenticator app, like Google Authenticator or Twilio’s Authy or even better a physical key such as the Yubikey or Google’s Titan Key. However, many services and users have stuck with text messaging for 2FA because it’s the least complex for users — and the issue with any security practice is that if it’s not user-friendly, no one will use it, and that doesn’t do any good either.

But using phone numbers given for 2FA purposes for notifications or marketing is really bad. First of all, it undermines trust — which is the last thing you want to do when dealing with a security mechanism. People handed over these phone numbers/emails for a very specific and delineated reason: to better protect their account. To then share that phone number or email with the marketing team is a massive violation in trust. And it serves to undermine the entire concept of two factor authentication, in that many users will become less willing to make use of 2FA, fearing how the numbers might be abused.

As we noted when Facebook received the mammoth $5 billion fine from the FTC a year ago, while the media focused almost entirely on the Cambridge Analytica situation as the reason for the fine, if you actually read the FTC’s settlement documents, it was other things that really caused the FTC to move, including Facebook’s use of 2FA phone numbers for marketing. We were glad that Facebook got punished for that.

And now it’s Twitter’s turn. Twitter has revealed that the FTC is preparing to fine the company 150millionto150 million to 150millionto250 million for this practice — noting that it violated the terms of an earlier consent decree with the FTC in 2011, where the company promised not to mislead users about how it handled personal information. Yet, for years, Twitter used the phone numbers and emails provided for 2FA to help target ads (basically using the phone number/email as an identifier for targeting).

There’s no explanation for this other than really bad handling of data at Twitter, and the company should be punished for it. There are many things I think Twitter gets unfairly blamed for, but a practice like this is both bad and dangerous, and I’m all for large fines from the FTC to convince companies to never do this kind of thing again.

Filed Under: 2fa, ftc, marketing, notifications, privacy, security, targeting, two factor authentication
Companies: twitter

Dear AHL: Get Your App Shit Together Because You're Freaking Us Out

from the crossing-lines dept

There are many, many ways for big companies’ attempts to use social media or smart apps to go horribly wrong. Usually these happenings involve either hacked into accounts repurposed for lulz, rogue employees having a bit too much to drink on beer Friday and then going off, or companies doing something stupid and then blaming either of the previous for it.

And then there’s the American Hockey League’s mobile app, which for some reason alerted users that Stewart Zimmel apparently both owes someone $6k and threatens to punch people in the throat.

The American Hockey League’s long-awaited schedule announcement for the 2019–20 season hit a minor road block on Wednesday, when the code behind the official app of the NHL’s top minor league became self-aware and demanded money from Stewart Zimmel. At least, that’s one way to interpret these confusing but very real screenshots of push notifications sent to users today, which accused Zimmel of threatening to punch someone named Ian Bowman in the throat “nemours times” (sic).

It wasn’t just this one Twitter user, either. Others stared quizzically at their phones, wondering why Stewart Zimmel won’t just pay back what he owes, not to mention why he would go around throat-punching people. Far from this being some one-off thing, the app later began displaying screenshots of communications in which someone named Zimmel kinda does threaten to punch someone in the throat. And, because the internet is a wonderful place, some people began trying to figure this mystery out.

Stewart Zimmel, for those wondering, is the COO of a company called HockeyTech, according to his LinkedIn. HockeyTech bought the company Zimmel previously worked for, Buzzer Apps, in 2018. Bowman, according to an older fragment of the Buzzer Apps LinkedIn page that’s archived on Google, used to work for the company too. It seems safe to assume that he worked on the AHL app—or at least knew how to hack it—and also that he feels he’s owed $6,000 from Zimmel.

The AHL has since gotten its app back under control, meaning that it is no longer sending users screenshots of threats of violence… so that’s good. On the other hand, it really shouldn’t be that hard to keep this kind of stuff from happening. And if you’re going to launch an app that can push notifications to the public’s phones, it’s probably best to have some checks in place to keep this sort of thing from happening.

Filed Under: hockey, notifications, stewart zimmel
Companies: ahl

Dentist Sues Another Unhappy Patient; Offers To Let Journalist See Patients' Private Files To Dispute Claims

from the zarrelli-school-of-reputation-management dept

Yelp — both a frequent target of misguided lawsuits and the host of many, many targets of similarly-misguided lawsuits — has instituted a nifty new flag that lets readers and reviewers know which businesses are issuing legal threats or filing lawsuits over negative reviews. The warning — pictured below — first showed up in May after Prestigious Pets went legal over a review it didn’t care for.

The warning has surfaced again at the page for Dr. Nima Dayani, a New York Dentist. Apparently, Dayani’s not a fan of criticism and has initiated legal proceedings against an unhappy customer, as Leticia Miranda of Buzzfeed reports.

Dayani, who says he gets plenty of positive and negative feedback on Yelp and is comfortable with both, says the claims by Rohs weren’t simply a negative review. He alleges her comments amount to defamation, and he sued Rohs two days after the review was posted. It’s an accusation the dentist has levied against at least four previous patients who have written negative reviews about his practice, according to a BuzzFeed News review of court records.

Dayani said false negative reviews like Rohs’ have harmed his practice over time. He said he laid off one part-time staff member because of a drop in business.

“[Rohs] accused me of malpractice by saying I didn’t diagnose her,” he said. “When you are publicly accusing someone of malpractice, you are damaging their reputation.”

This is an odd claim, considering Rohs never once uses the word malpractice in her review, or even alleges anything to that effect. She says she endured a very long wait to see Dr. Dayani and, when he finally did see her, he was “curt and dismissive.”

Dr. Dayani was curt and dismissive, and seemed annoyed with the way I answered his questions. But he did seem to be genuinely interested in finding out what was causing my pain, and how it can be helped. However, it was an absurdly long wait. After about an HOUR, I was finally seen (my appt was at 11AM). Then after speaking with him for about 5-10 minutes, he left me for “just a second” to deal with another patient… I didn’t see him for another half hour. Of the total TWO HOURS FIFTEEN MINUTES I was there, I think I was speaking to Dr. Dayani for about 30 minutes of that whole time. The rest was spent in his chair, without being offered a water or a magazine. And at the end of it all, he couldn’t help determine what was bothering me. I left with a mouth full of pain and a recommendation to see my dentist for a possible cavity.

Four lawsuits against four unhappy patients is no way to run a business. Dayani may claim he only goes after those posting “false” information, but his summation of Rohs’ complaint against him is so far off-base, it makes one wonder what he considers to be “false.”

But more disturbing than his tendency to sue negative reviewers is the offer he made to Buzzfeed News, as pointed out by Adam Steinbaugh.

Dayani insists that he only goes after online reviewers who post false information. He offered BuzzFeed News the opportunity to visit his office and review records related to the cases where he has sued patients to prove their allegations are false. BuzzFeed News declined.

When a medical professional offers to potentially violate HIPAA privacy protections to protect his reputation, it’s a pretty good sign the medical professional doesn’t have much reputation left to burn. This indicates — along with the lawsuits — that Dr. Dayani isn’t quite as receptive to criticism as he claims.

The upshot is that Yelp is now publicly calling out businesses who use legal threats and litigation to manage their reputations. It serves as a counterweight to those whose ratings might seem suspiciously high and serve as a warning to those who might be unhappy with their experience, but not quite ready to retain a lawyer.

Filed Under: defamation, free speech, nima dayani, notifications, reviews
Companies: yelp

Why Does The US Patent Office Keep Approving Clearly Ridiculous Patents?

from the patent-office-is-as-patent-office-does dept

Imagine you’re on your way to deliver a case of beer to a party. Before you get there, your boss sends you a text: They want 2 cases now. You read the text while driving (don’t do that), so you deliver an extra case when you arrive. Having successfully completed that task, you leave for your next delivery.

Congratulations! You might get sued by the owner of April’s stupid patent of the month.

This month’s winner, US Patent No. 9,013,334 (the ‘334 patent), has the prosaic title: Notification systems and methods that permit change of quantity for delivery and/or pickup of goods and/or services. It issued just last week, on April 21, 2015. As its title suggests, the patent claims a “method” of updating delivery information. It belongs to Eclipse IP LLC, one of the most litigious patent trolls in the country. Eclipse belongs to an elite group of trolls (such as Arrivalstar and Geotag) that have filed over 100 lawsuits.

Eclipse owns a patent family of more than 20 patents, all of which claim priority back to a single 2003 provisional application. These patents claim various closely related “notification systems.” Eclipse interprets its patents very broadly and has asserted them against a wide range of mundane business practices. For example, in January it sent a letter claiming that Tiger Fitness infringes one of these patents by sending emails to customers updating them about the status of orders. This letter explains that “Eclipse IP aggressively litigates patent infringement lawsuits” and that “litigation is expensive and time consuming.” The letter demands a $45,000 payment.

We think that all of Eclipse’s patents deserve a stupid patent of the month award. But the ‘334 patent is especially deserving. This is because the Patent Office issued this patent after a federal court invalidated similar claims from other patents in the same family. On September 4, 2014, Judge Wu of the Central District of California issued an order invalidating claims from three of Eclipse’s patents. The court explained that these patents claim abstract ideas like checking to see if a task has been completed. Judge Wu applied the Supreme Court’s recent decision in Alice v CLS Bank and held the claims invalid under Section 101 of the Patent Act.

All of Eclipse’s patents were both “invented” and prosecuted by a patent attorney named Scott Horstemeyer (who just so happens to have prosecuted Arrivalstar‘s patents too). Patent applicants and their attorneys have an ethical obligation to disclose any information material to patentability. Despite this, from what we can tell from the Patent Office’s public access system PAIR, Horstemeyer did not disclose Judge Wu’s decision to the examiner during the prosecution of the ‘334 patent, even though the decision invalidated claims in the patent family. While Horstemeyer has not made any genuine contribution to notification “technology,” he has shown advanced skill at gaming the patent system.

Judge Wu’s reasoning applies directly to the ‘334 patent. While one claim in the ‘334 patent expressly requires “computer program code” executed to carry out the method, this does not make a difference. Indeed, Judge Wu explained that, under Alice, it is not enough that the claimed methods must be performed by a “specially programmed” computer. It appears Horstemeyer hoped the Office would not notice this decision and would simply rubber-stamp his application. Sadly, that is exactly what happened. The Patent Office issued the Patent No. 9,013,334 without raising Alice or Section 101 at all. We believe this is part of a disturbing trend of Patent Office decisions that ignore Alice where courts have struck down almost identical claims.

Trolls like Eclipse will continue to thrive as long as the Patent Office gives them stupid patents and courts allow them to use the cost of litigation to extort settlements. Reform such as the Innovation Act will make abusive patent litigation less attractive. But we need broader reform to stop the Patent Office from being a rubber stamp for vague and overbroad software patents.

Late breaking addition: As if to drive home just how much of a rubber stamp it is, the Patent Office issued yet another patent to Eclipse yesterday. Patent No. 9,019,130 is almost identical to the ‘334 patent, except it deals with updating “time” information instead of “quantity” information.

Republished from the EFF’s Stupid Patent of the Month series

Filed Under: deliveries, notifications, patents, uspto
Companies: eclipse ip

Bad Lawyer Tricks, By John Steele

from the not-a-good-idea dept

Last week, we wrote about a bunch of the members of Team Prenda submitting separate filings with Judge Otis Wright, who has been the most vocal in calling them out for their questionable legal shenanigans, trying (once again) to go on the offense and accuse their accusers. John Steele, Paul Hansmeier, Peter Hansmeier and Mark Lutz all filed motions claiming that the lawyers representing the John Doe defendant in the case, Morgan Pietz and Nick Ranallo, had failed to serve each of them with updated filings concerning the case. Incredibly, they tried to suggest that it was Pietz and Ranallo who were acting fraudulently and should be sanctioned. It’s the classic John Steele move of “I know you are, but what am I” any time anyone calls him on his activities.

Pietz and Ranallo, having now been ridiculously accused of fraudulent activity, have hired another lawyer, Lawrence Heller, to represent them on this silly tangent, and Heller submitted quite a response, focused on John Steele’s motion. The filings from the other three are dismissed in a footnote:

Mark Lutz, Paul Hansmeier and Peter Hansmeier have filed what they call “Notices to the Court,” which are unsworn pleadings which attempt to evidence that they have not received certain pleadings since going pro se. Among numerous other defects, these “Notices” are neither verified, nor sworn under penalty of perjury and, to the extent they have any evidentiary value at all, should be struck or at least wholly ignored.

But the arguments against Steele’s filing are much more serious. As you may recall, this was actually Steele’s second attempt at making this argument, with the first one getting rejected by Judge Wright in less than an hour. The claims that Steele and the others were somehow taken by surprise by the filings in this case and were unaware of them are hard to support, and Heller makes that point excessively clear. First, Heller points out that Steele’s claim that Pietz and Ranallo had submitted “scores of papers” without serving him, and that those papers were “requests for relief” was entirely bogus. Steele was represented by counsel for quite some time, and after he went pro se (representing himself) Pietz and Ranallo had only filed two documents, both merely opposing specific motions from Team Prenda.

Furthermore, Heller points out that the only one actually violating the court’s rules are the members of Team Prenda who failed to properly notify a change in contact information, leading to the lack of direct service. Most seriously, Heller says that the email “evidence” that Steele submitted with his filing, which he claims is “proof” that Pietz knew he wasn’t serving Steele, has been doctored. And, finally, Heller points out that this all just seems par for the course for Team Prenda in playing word games rather than facing up to the fact that they’re in deep trouble:

Although already sanctioned by this court, it is clear that neither Steele nor his contingent have learned their lesson. As frivolous as Steele’s motion is, Pietz and Ranallo were compelled to retain outside counsel to defend it. Pietz and Ranallo should be compensated for having to respond to this baseless motion through the court’s issuance, on its own initiatve, of an OSC re: Sanctions or, alternatively, through the court’s setting of a hearing date for Pietz and Ranallo to have their Rule 11 sanctions motion heard…

It must be said: finally, enough is enough!

As for Steele’s “evidence,” Heller points out, as is clear from the email itself, that rather than an admission of a failure on the part of Pietz, Pietz’s email is actually an attempt to stop Steele from avoiding service, by noting that Pietz is happy to send Steele copies of the filing, by whatever means are most appropriate — and that this wouldn’t have been an issue if Steele had properly kept everyone informed of his correct contact information, as is clearly required by the court. Separately, they point out that plenty of evidence, including some submitted by Steele himself has clearly established what his email address is, which is also where Pietz sent copies of the filings that Steele claims were never given to him.

Moreover, Steele himself has submitted evidence to this Court definitively establishing that he maintains at least the email address: johnlsteele@gmail.com. Specifically, in his “Amended” Motion For Reconsideration (ECF No. 205, pp. 6-7), Steele for, the first time attaches as Exhibit 1 the email which be omitted from the original Motion for Reconsideration (ECF No. 201), and which he swears, under penalty of perjury, that he received at the said email address. Steele’s submission of the June 23rd email confirms that he does in fact have an email account he has used recently, and that he is therefore in violation of L.R. 41-6 and L.R. 83-2.4, for failing to provide that email address to the Court and to all parties. Similarly, Steele’s Illinois ARDC page lists a phone number; so he has one of those too, which he has also neglected to provide to the Court or the parties. There can be little doubt that he also has a fax number he failed to disclose. In View of Steele’s violations of the local rule designed to facilitate service of process, the instant motion is clearly brought in bad faith.

And then we get to the funny stuff. The email “evidence” that Steele submitted to the court was an email that Pietz sent, but when he sent it, it bounced back, saying that there was no such email address. That leads to one of two possibilities, neither of which look good for Steele:

In view of Mr. Steele’s sworn assertion that he actually did receive the June 23rd email from Pietz, it is thus surprising that the email in question, which was sent to immediately bounced back to sender from that address. (See Pietz Dec’l., Exhibit 1). In light of the bounce-back, there are only two possibilities: either Steele has somehow configured his Gmail account to automatically respond with false “Delivery to the following recipient failed permanently” messages to all emails he receives, even though he actually does receive the messages; or (ii) as seems more probable, Steele did not receive the June 23rd email directly, but rather it was forwarded to him by one of his cronies who was also included on Pietz’s email chain. A close look at the top of Steele’s Exhibit A shows partial text remnants. Moreover, the email is of an abnormally small size. Both of these facts strongly suggest that a header has been cutoff at the top of the email to conceal how it was received. It seems apparent that Steele has purposefully omitted an email header, which would presumably show one of his co-conspirators forwarding the June 23rd message from Pietz to whatever new email address Steele is using nowadays.

Since Steele’s motion, as well as his sworn affidavit, tacitly rely upon the premise that he has not been in close contact with Paul Hansmeier, Paul Duffy, and counsel for Prenda Law, Inc., about the bond issue since going pro se, one can certainly understand why he may have been tempted to cut out the header showing him communicating with these people. In other words, in what would seem to be a truly staggering–and foolish–bit of chutzpah, Steele appears to have once again tried to slip a doctored document past this Court in the hopes of getting his way.

Further, given that the johnlsteele@gmail.com email address was used by “someone” to register certain Internet domain names to “Alan Cooper” at a Phoenix residence where Steele’s sister lived with Anthony Saltmarsh, there can be little question as to why Steele might have been tempted to discontinue using that account. Using that email address potentially links Steele to criminal identity theft activity. However, thanks to his recent filing. Mr. Steele has now sworn under penalty of perjury, that he has recently received email sent to johnlsteele@gmail.com even though that may be perjury.

You get the feeling that John Steele is stupendously bad at chess, while simultaneously believing that he could beat Kasparov and Deep Blue in concurrent matches. The more he talks, each time believing he’s found the magic “out,” the deeper he seems to dig his own hole. This is a different kind of digging than, say, a Charles Carreon, who would just keep fighting. Steele acts as if he really thinks that he has the whole system beat, when the reality is each time he tries to “beat” the system, he’s just piling up another potential problem for himself.

For example, there’s also more evidence that Steele is making claims to the court that are not just bogus, but where Steele’s own actions show that they are bogus:

However, through what may have been an inadvertent slip-up, there is compelling evidence that Steele was actually aware, or should have been aware of ECF No. 175 (Pietz’s opposition to Duffy’s motion to approve the initial bond) since at least June 14, 2013. On May 23, 2013, Paul Duffy filed his motion to have the bond he posted on behalf of all Prenda parties other than Gibbs approved by this Court (ECF No. 171). On June 3, 2013, Pietz filed a response asking that the bond be conditionally approved, subject to certain conditions, and subject to the posting ofan additional bond (ECF No. 175). It is this document, ECF No. 175, from early June, which Steele would later say he was denied an opportunity to respond to. On June 6, 2013, the Court entered the proposed order submitted with the response, conditionally approving the bond, as requested by Pietz (ECF No. 176). On June I 1, 2013, Prenda Law, Inc. through associate Philip Vineyard of the Kleindinst Firm, announced by email to all parties (including to johnlsteele@gmail.com) that they would be appealing the Court’s order on the bond (i.e., appealing ECF No. 176) and filing an emergency motion seeking relief from the Ninth Circuit on that issue. (Pietz Dec’l., Exhibit B.)

By itself, the email from Philip Vineyard to Steele et al. Would have been sufficient to put Steele on notice of the fact that proceedings were underway in the District Court on the bond issue. See id. at pp. 1-2. The fact that Prenda was appealing the issue would also have put Steele on notice that the bond proceedings had not gone as his similarly situated counterparts may have hoped. However, that is not all that happens on the email thread.

On June 14, 2013, at 9:54 AM, Mr. Vineyard circulated to all parties what he styled a “pre-executed version of Prenda Law’s emergency motion to the Ninth Circuit” on the bond issue. Id. at. p. 11

About a half hour later, at 10:20 AM, John Steele wrote back to Mr. Vineyard, copying Pietz, saying,

> “Philip, > Great motion. On page 5, I want to take issue with the bottom of the page, right before footnote 23. No one that I am aware of (on our side) stated that Prenda or anyone else had a policy of demanding a settlement amount just low enough to avoid legal action. This is something the bad guys always claim.” Id. at 14.

Vineyard then wrote back a few minutes later saying “Thanks, John. I shall amend the motion to reflect this.” Both the “pre-execution” version Vineyard circulated, which Steele apparently reviewed and provided guidance on, as well as the final version ultimately filed with the Ninth Circuit, extensively discuss Pietz’s opposition to Duffy’s motion to the approve the bond (ECF No. 175). Clearly, Steele reviewed Vineyards motion on June 14, 2013, and Vineyard’s motion discusses at length the opposition (i.e., ECF No. 175) to which Steele states he was denied an opportunity to respond because he was unaware of it. There can be no question that Steele had every opportunity to respond to Pietz’s opposition, despite his false claims, which form the basis of his motion, to the contrary.

Further, Steele has known that there would be a dispute about the amount and conditions of the bond since at least May 20, 2013. See ECF No. 175-2, pp. 1-5 (meet and confer email from Pietz to Prenda parties, including to johnlsteele@gmail.com, which was ignored by all of them, except for some nonsensical ramblings from Mr. Duffy).

In view of all this evidence, it seems that Steele was just about as “shocked” about the bond issue before this Court as Captain Renault was to find that gambling was going on at Rick’s Cafe Americain.

Here’s a basic tip: if you’re going to claim to a court that you have no idea certain documents are being filed, probably don’t (a) use the same email address that the very same documents were mailed to and (b) don’t send the counsel you’re accusing of not informing you of documents filed in the very case in question — that you insist you’re not paying attention to — email evidence that you’re not only very much paying attention, but actively involved in the drafting, review and approval of filings in the case.

In a footnote, the filing also notes that this is more evidence that Steele has a leading role in Team Prenda’s legal strategy, despite his claims to have absolutely nothing to do with any of it:

This obviously begs the question of why counsel for Prenda Law, Inc., whose “sole principal” is supposedly Paul Duffy is taking their marching orders from Steele, a party with which Prenda likely has a conflict (particularly in view of Hansmeier’s deposition testimony that obtaining the Alan Cooper signatures was all Steele’s doing).

This case just gets more and more and more entertaining.

Filed Under: john steele, morgan pietz, nicholas ranallo, notifications, otis wright, service
Companies: af holdings, prenda, prenda law

Cleveland Bus System Joins Over 100 Others In Being Sued For Patent Infringement For Notifying People If A Bus Is Running Late

from the patent-trolling dept

Roman points us to the interesting news that the Cleveland Regional Transit Authority has been sued for patent infringement for this daring and shocking bit of piracy: notifying riders that a bus may be late and when it’s likely to arrive. You see most normal people would think that this is an obvious idea to those skilled in the art. The reason it wasn’t done in the past wasn’t because the idea was so difficult to contemplate, or that it was a huge technological challenge, it was merely a limitation of the other technology that makes this possible. Once GPS technology got cheaper, wireless data transmission became more widespread and cheaper and (finally) more people started carrying smartphones (or even SMS-capable phones) this kind of feature sprung up all over the place. It wasn’t because some random dude patented the idea, but because it’s obvious once all the other key pieces are in place, and it’s relatively easy to implement.

But don’t tell that to Martin Jones, who holds a bunch of these patents. The “Clevescene” story above does not identify the patents or link to the actual legal filing (why don’t news sites do that?!?), but after looking around, it’s easy to find that Jones and the company he represents have filed over a hundred lawsuits like this recently over a variety of patents. I’m not sure exactly which patents he’s claiming in this particular case, but here’s Patent # 5,400,020 for a school bus notification system and Patent # 5,623,260 for a notification system for “impending arrival of a transportation vehicle.” There are a lot more similar patents that all seem to be slight variations on the same thing. It seems he had this idea and has tried to lock it up and demand payment from tons and tons of companies — with many agreeing to pay up.

Filed Under: bus, martin jones, notifications, patents, transportation

Oh Look, Apple Copies Android, And That's Not A Bad Thing

from the copying-is-okay dept

While a lot of the attention on today’s Apple announcements were around the cloud stuff, there were a bunch of changes to iOS announced, too, and what was striking was how many of them really looked like Apple scrambling to play catchup to Android on certain features — with the pull down notifications being a key such feature. That feature is standard on my Android phone and has been for some time, and it looks almost identical to the Apple iOS implementation.

Of course, this is only fair. Google has clearly copied many of the features of iOS, in building up Android. In fact, I think most people would reasonably agree that Android owes a far greater debt to Apple than Apple owes to Google for features. But the point is that this sort of innovation goes both ways. Whenever we hear about complaints about “copying” or “ripping off” features, people seem to ignore the fact that everyone does this, and it pushes everyone to do more in the future. It increases the pace of innovation. If Android didn’t have such a notification bar (which is quite effective), Apple might not have realized what a disjointed mess its old notifications were. Thus, this ends up improving Apple. Not only that, but it gives both parties reasons to think about making the notification effort even better, going forward, to continue to differentiate.

Now, some might claim that if Google had been able to block such copies via patents, Apple would have had to “invent around” this and create something different. But would that really have been useful or efficient? Doesn’t seem like it. Under that scenario, one party is inventing something new for the sake of inventing something new. Under the way it is here, everyone has incentive to create something new, only if it really improves the offering. That seems like a much better path to innovation.

Filed Under: android, copying, innovation, ios, notifications
Companies: apple, google

Blockbuster, Netflix Found Not To Have Infringed On Patent For Notifying You Of The Status Of Your Rental Queue

from the how-did-this-get-approved? dept

Slashdot points us to the news that a lawsuit against Netflix and Blockbuster for patent infringement has been dismissed by a California court. At issue was a patent, 7,389,243, that is for a method for alerting users to the status of their rental queue. Read through the claims and look at the drawings and try to figure out how such a patent was possibly approved. It’s patents like this one that make people question what patent examiners actually do. So it’s nice to see the patent holder sent packing, though you have to wonder if GameFly, who had previously settled a lawsuit over the same patent is now regretting that decision.

Filed Under: movie rentals, notifications, patents
Companies: blockbuster, netflix