News of the Cyber World

[kyonides]

FTC Appeals Again the Microsoft-Activision Merger

The FTC on Thursday night asked (pdf) the San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which hears cases from California and other states in the U.S. West, to issue a preliminary injunction that pauses the deal while the agency prepares to challenge it at a trial in August.

U.S. judge Jacqueline Scott Corley ruled on Tuesday that Microsoft can proceed with its planned acquisition of videogame maker Activision Blizzard for $69 billion after the European Union (EU) approved the deal between the two gaming companies.

The FTC’s bid must clear some critical hurdles to succeed, legal experts said.

A U.S. federal appeals court will have a number of options available to it as it weighs that appeal, but legal professionals noted the rushed timing and the need to prove any alleged error by the district court judge merits overturning her decision could hinder the antitrust enforcer’s effort.

In its appeal, the FTC said Judge Corley’s order allowing Microsoft to move ahead with the deal incorrectly held the agency to a legal standard that was too high.
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Judge Corley’s temporary order prohibiting the deal expires at 11:59 p.m. Pacific Time on Friday, and so the appeals court will be expected to issue an order on Friday. Microsoft and Activision are set to close the deal on July 18.

The appeals court could “administratively” block the deal for at least a few days, allowing a panel of judges more time to study the dispute and to rule, several legal experts said.

The court alternatively could grant the FTC’s request for an injunction—which could create a much longer pause—or outright deny it.

Kathleen Bradish, who oversees legal advocacy at the American Antitrust Institute, said the FTC “certainly has valid grounds” to question the trial judge’s order.

Elon Musk’s X Corp Sues 4 Entities He Says Are Scraping Twitter Data

Elon Musk’s X Corp., the California-based company that owns and operates Twitter, has filed a lawsuit against four entities in Texas. The lawsuit accuses the defendants of data scraping from the social media site and causing issues for the platform’s users.

The lawsuit was filed in a Dallas County District Court on July 6 and is seeking more than $1 million in damages (pdf). The filing comes just days after the social media company’s recent policy change placing limits on the number of tweets a user can view each day.

“Several entities tried to scrape every tweet ever made in a short period of time. That is why we had to put rate limits in place,” Mr. Musk wrote on Twitter on Thursday, July 13, in a reply to T(w)itter Daily News about the lawsuit.
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X Corp claims that the defendants unlawfully collected data on Texas residents and impaired the experience of Twitter users.

“The volume of these requests far exceeded what any single individual could send to a server in a given period and clearly indicated that these automated requests were aimed at scraping data from Twitter,” according to the complaint. “These requests have severely taxed X Corp.’s servers and impaired the user experience for millions of X Corp.’s customers.”

The lawsuit also alleges that the companies scraping the data are able to repackage and profit from the information they collected unbeknownst to the Twitter user.
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They are identified by the aliases: John Doe 1, John Doe 2, John Doe 3, and John Doe 4; and described as “persons or entities” associated with specified IP addresses.

“To avoid detection, data scrapers deploy software and other technology to mask their identities and penetrate networks that would otherwise be private,” the document reads.

The software used by data scrapers sends a massive number of requests, making them difficult to detect while causing the platform to become less stable.