Parker v. Google [1]

Gordon Parker sued Google in federal court in Pennsylvania in August 2004. According to court documents, Parker claimed that he published a website, "29 Reasons Not to be a Nice Guy." He alleged that an unknown Internet user copied Reason #6 and posted it on USENET, which Google then made accessible via its Google Groups service. Parker also alleged that Google defamed him by enabling users to access links to websites disparaging him using its search engine function and invaded his privacy by creating an unauthorized biography of him whenever someone "googled" his name.

The district court dismissed all of Parker's claims. It held that Parker's claim of direct copyright infringement failed because he did not allege volitional conduct on the part of Google in making the USENET posts available. The claim of contributory copyright infringement failed, according to the court, because Parker failed to show that Google had knowledge of the offending posts, and the vicarious infringement claim failed because Google did not have a direct financial interest in its user's posting of allegedly copyrighted material.

The court held that Parker's defamation, invasion of privacy, and negligence claims were defeated by CDA 230 [2], which protects providers of interactive computer services from tort liability for publishing the statements or content of third parties, because he did not allege that Google was the "information content provider" of the offending material. His other claims were also dismissed as "futile" because the plaintiff failed to set out the basic elements of each of these claims.

The Third Circuit affirmed [3] the decision.