Oregon Woman Sues Yahoo for $3 Million

bigtallmofo writes "After notifying Yahoo that two member profiles about her were not authorized, Cecilia Barnes of Oregon is suing Yahoo for $3 million for failing to take down the profiles in a timely manner. The profiles allegedly set up by her ex-boyfriend contained nude photos of her along with her email address and work phone number. (Note: The member profiles have since been taken down by Yahoo)."

Comments

Adult Groups a Liability Risk

[geomon]

I think that portal-based adult groups will probably go "bye-bye" if they are viewed as a financial risk to the hosting site. Yahoo puts all of this webspace up without asking questions about the veracity of the information and then doesn't have the resources to properly police it. I'm sure MSN will drop theirs as well if this case goes against Yahoo.

I'm sure that this woman is not the first person who has had an ex-boyfriend/husband/lover post nude pictures of them on the net.

Re:Adult Groups a Liability Risk

[EyesofWolf]

I agree, she definitely can't be the first. If you think about this before the internet, there have been cases where people have had naked or otherwise naughty pictures of themselves exposed in printed format before. You don't sue the copy store that allowed the person to make photocopies, do you? She should probably be suing the ex.

Of course, on the other hand, the part of her argument that does hold water is that she asked for the profiles to be taken down since they were fradulent. I do think it is reasonable to expect a reasonable turn around time from the company if you find something out there that you did not post. According to the article, she sent requests over three months, and received no response.

Re:Adult Groups a Liability Risk

[Y2]

So why doesn't she sue her ex-boyfriend whom posted this information without her consent?

He doesn't have three million dollars.

Re:Adult Groups a Liability Risk

[Retric]

He used said information as part of a larger act of fraud so he is clearly liable. He might have been allowed to post those pics and that information but he also impersonated him in chat sessions to get men to show up at her office thinking they where going to have sex with her.

Now AOL might not be required to take down her pictures and / or contact information but clearly letting him continue to use there system for months after they had been notified he was committing fraud with their system exposes them to some risk.

IMO 3mil seems like a reasonable level of compensation for an organization that willfully allowed such level of harassment to continue for months. It's not like she is trying to get them to verify all information in their system just to have a system to take information down in the event it's misused. Think of the risk they would be taking if the pictures where of a 13 year old and they waited months to take them down.

Re:Adult Groups a Liability Risk

[metlin]

This is another "i spilled hot coffee on my self now im going to sue you!" deal.

Okay, have you even seen the whole case of the hot-coffee lawsuit? Or checked the facts?

That was an old woman, and the coffee was spilled down her lap and other surrounding areas causing third degree burns on that required skin grafts and a hospital stay for seven-days.

She had approached them first for medical compensation and was refused, at which point she sued them. And incidentally, a judge later lowered the awarding amount to merely $480,000, which the media never publicized.

And btw, McDonalds serves their coffee at 185 degrees, a good 20 degrees more than other restaurants - there have been cases of folks with first degree burns because of that.

At the temperature that McDonalds serves their coffee, it just takes about five seconds for first degree burns to occur - which would require skin grafting.

Next time you shoot off your mouth without knowing the facts, you might want to look at the reasons why some lawsuits may have been won. I hate frivolous lawsuits too, but that doesn't mean I walk around talking nonsense.

My idea for a new google product

[stlhawkeye]

nudes.google.com

Enter somebody's name, find all known nude photographs of that person. Needn't even be celebrities.

Before we all flood archive.org..

[irc.goatse.cx troll]

I tried it, They don't have either profile. No google cache either. :(

Re:Why sue Yahoo and not the ex-boyfriend?

[CrawlingEvil]

From the article:

Barnes sent Yahoo a letter in January saying she did not create the profiles and wanted them removed. Additional attempts to get Yahoo to remove them in February and March did not get a response, the lawsuit claims.

So, basically, she's suing because Yahoo left the images up for three months after being contacted and asked to take them down. Considering her personal information went along the photos, not acting on the information in a timely fashion is pretty serious, because it helped prolong her harassment.

As for the boyfriend, he should probably be brought up on criminal charges.

Serious Issue

[airship]

I've been trying for a year to get classmates.com to remove the listing for my wife, who died. It's seriously disturbing to go up there and see her still listed. So I don't go anymore.

The issues of who owns accounts, how they are handled when someone dies, and whether a host is responsible for verifying information in a public listing, have simply not yet been addressed, even though the web is 13 years old.

Re:OKAY HERE THEY ARE!

[bluedream]

Umm.. Is that her with the dog?

No wonder she is sueing.

Re:You know...

[Jboy_24]

First this article
from a coffee maker states the recomended serving temperature is 75 degrees C (167 fahrenheit). The correct Brewing temperature is 185-195. But rather then nit-pick about temperature. Here's why McDonalds lost: ( Mcfacts snipped from a site, others collected elsewhere)

1: The injured women initially wanted $800 from McDonalds to pay for extra medical bills, to which McDonald's dismissed.

2. Evidence showed that McDonalds served their coffee so hot to save money. This let them get away with a cheaper grade of coffee and cut down on the number of free refills they had to give away. McDonalds executives testified that they thought it would be cheaper to pay claims and worker's compensation benefits to people burned by their coffee versus making any of these changes. (source http://www.osmond-riba.org/lis/essay_mcdonalds.htm )
McFact No. 1: For years, McDonald's had known they had a problem with the way they make their coffee - that their coffee was served much hotter (at least 20 degrees more so) than at other restaurants.

McFact No. 2: McDonald's knew its coffee sometimes caused serious injuries - more than 700 incidents of scalding coffee burns in the past decade have been settled by the Corporation - and yet they never so much as consulted a burn expert regarding the issue.

McFact No. 3: The woman involved in this infamous case suffered very serious injuries - third degree burns on her groin, thighs and buttocks that required skin grafts and a seven-day hospital stay.

McFact No. 4: The woman, an 81-year old former department store clerk who had never before filed suit against anyone, said she wouldn't have brought the lawsuit against McDonald's had the Corporation not dismissed her request for compensation for medical bills.

McFact No. 5: A McDonald's quality assurance manager testified in the case that the Corporation was aware of the risk of serving dangerously hot coffee and had no plans to either turn down the heat or to post warning about the possibility of severe burns, even though most customers wouldn't think it was possible.

McFact No. 6: After careful deliberation, the jury found McDonald's was liable because the facts were overwhelmingly against the company. When it came to the punitive damages, the jury found that McDonald's had engaged in willful, reckless, malicious, or wanton conduct, and rendered a punitive damage award of 2.7 million dollars. (The equivalent of just two days of coffee sales, McDonalds Corporation generates revenues in excess of 1.3 million dollars daily from the sale of its coffee, selling 1 billion cups each year.)

McFact No. 7: On appeal, a judge lowered the award to $480,000, a fact not widely publicized in the media.

McFact No. 8: A report in Liability Week, September 29, 1997, indicated that Kathleen Gilliam, 73, suffered first degree burns when a cup of coffee spilled onto her lap. Reports also indicate that McDonald's consistently keeps its coffee at 185 degrees, still approximately 20 degrees hotter than at other restaurants. Third degree burns occur at this temperature in just two to seven seconds, requiring skin grafting, debridement and whirlpool treatments that cost tens of thousands of dollars and result in permanent disfigurement, extreme pain and disability to the victims for many months, and in some cases, years.

It all comes down to, if you are in the business of dealing with materials you know are hazerdous (as was proven in the case, McDonalds knew the coffee was hazerdous), you are responsible for selling such materials in a safe maner because the consumer expects you to do so. If you were "Battery Acid King" and sold sulphuric acid in open topped beverage glasses, people might assume you don't think its dangerous.