International Law

Facebook sued for HAVING privacy controls

TechCrunch is reporting that Facebook is facing a patent infringement lawsuit in the US for having privacy controls. Yup, you heard that right. The plaintiff is alleging that Facebook's privacy controls infringe a prior patent.

You simply can't win in this world.

Here's a blurb:

Facebook Sued For Having Privacy Controls In Place. Yes, Seriously.

... In short, because Facebook enables people to have some control over their privacy on the popular social networking sites by effectively letting users decide which information you share with whom, Walker Digital believes the company infringes one of its ?inventions?.

Provided I?ve understood the complaint correctly and the whole thing isn?t an early April Fools joke, this whole suit is just plain laughable.

In a reaction to the Bloomberg piece, a Facebook spokesperson said they would fight the suit vigorously, calling it ?completely frivolous?. This time, I can?t help but agree with them.

You can read the full docket over at Justia.

Full post as published by The Canadian Privacy Law Blog on November 30, 2010 (boomark / email).