Federal courts have held for decades that interactive computer services cannot be considered publishers for the purpose of determining liability to users for content published by third parties. This area of the law was developed in the infancy of the internet, and technology has advanced leaps and bounds faster than the law has.

The relevant statute in these cases is 47 U.S.C. § 230 (the Communications Decency Act of 1996), which states that “no provider or use of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.” In lay terms, online media platforms (think YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, etc.) that host content created and/or shared by third-party users cannot be held liable unless the provider is directly responsible for creating it.

The Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution protects individuals against unreasonable searches and seizures by the government. However, a litigant must have the standing to challenge a governmental action under the Fourth Amendment. To establish Fourth Amendment standing, a party must show that their reasonable expectations of privacy have been infringed upon. In the context of mail, standing can present a unique obstacle for a claimant. The Circuit Courts have disagreed about what reasonable privacy expectations an individual who uses a nickname or alias has in the mail they intend to send or receive.

In formulating the prison mailbox rule, the Houston Court specified the struggles of “pro se prisoner[s]” in filing paperwork. So, does this rule, where a prisoner’s notice of appeal is filed when he hands it to prison officials to be mailed, apply to all prisoners, including those represented by counsel (broad interpretation), or only to pro se prisoners (narrow interpretation)?

Under a wireless services contract that binds consumers to arbitrate any disputes with the providing company and its affiliates, may a satellite television company that became an affiliate of a wireless services provider several years after the signing of such contract compel arbitration when a consumer brings a suit under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act?

Is the discharge of pollutants without a permit from a point source into groundwater, which then leads to the discharge of these pollutants into navigable waters, prohibited under the CWA? Does the CWA ban only the discharge of pollutants from point sources directly into navigable waters?