Supreme Court arguments make it clear that FCC fines are “nonbinding”
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I would love to be on a jury awarding fines for such behavior. If my peers have similar opinions as mine, then I expect telecoms will be begging to pay the FCC decided fine before facing any twelve Americans who had their information sold.
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No, fine would be an effective congress and senate to slap this shit down and write new law stopping this foolishness. Then create a new law requiring SC justices to step down after their 75th birthday.
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Nope! I don't think anything can do more harm to the carrier's reputation than the self-inflicted harm they do by fucking over their customers on a regular basis.
The corporations ignoring fines is pretty SOP these days anyhow. So if that's normal, then there's no reputational harm to the carriers. They universally fucking suck balls in their behaviors.
You can't put enough lipstick on those pigs to make them even look somewhat good.
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Jury Question to Judge: We see a minimum per incident, is there a maximum?
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It doesn't really say whether the jury can alter the fine, but I'm pretty sure that, if that is an option, the company would opt for a bench trial.
There maybe you wouldn't be able to have a bench trail, no idea if there are rules about when you can do that in civil court...
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Isn’t this like arguing that a police officer can’t give you a ticket because until the trial there’s an unlitigated ticket on your record? And if that’s really an issue, isn’t the remedy that an unlitigated ticket can’t be used against you?
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The Law is really just a bunch of suggestions?
Regulations are just friendly advice?
And fines are merely a request for a charitable donation?
Does this actually make sense, or is this the ideological bias of the Federalist Society, putting it's thumb on the scales of justice?
Regulations are just friendly advice?
And fines are merely a request for a charitable donation?
Does this actually make sense, or is this the ideological bias of the Federalist Society, putting it's thumb on the scales of justice?
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Let them go to trial. I'm less concerned about that than I am Appeals Courts striking down any guilty verdict because they're bought and paid for.
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oh, can I use that excuse next time? I mean if large corporations with lots of lawyers can be so easily misled what about us common folk?
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Which is essentially true*, you can dispute and litigate a ticket. He can issue a ticket (the FCC fine) but you can either pay or litigate.
*IANAL or in the US, but I assume that's the case in any sane western democracy, like it is here in NZL
ETA Clarity
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It feels especially disheartening to hear that companies are complaining and getting a right to a trial, when they themselves are including arbitration clauses in all consumer agreements now that explicitly waive a customer's right to trial.
To be sure, I don't think companies deserve to lose the right to a trial by jury. But hearing them specifically crying "7th amendment!" when they're actively negating that for the masses is so frustrating.
To be sure, I don't think companies deserve to lose the right to a trial by jury. But hearing them specifically crying "7th amendment!" when they're actively negating that for the masses is so frustrating.
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Maybe I could use this excuse when I have to pay for my overpriced internet connection. Tell them "I see your price guarantees speeds up to xxx Mbps, so I guess my monthly payment should scale with the same frivolity that you consider complying with FCC fines with. You get NOTHING this month. Pray I feel like paying something next month."
Oh wait, that only works if you're a $billion dollar conglomerate who owns a bunch of Senators, Representatives, and has access to unlimited lobbyist budgets? Damn.
Oh wait, that only works if you're a $billion dollar conglomerate who owns a bunch of Senators, Representatives, and has access to unlimited lobbyist budgets? Damn.
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No one is saying any of that. All this means is that it takes a judicial process to force a punishment against the punishee’s objections, which has been the regulator’s official stance since 1978.
Especially given the current administration, do you really want to argue that the Executive should have sole discretion to apply punishments without judicial process?
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And to be as fair as possible, I'm pretty sure that the telecoms would want their bench trial held at a specific court in Texas, just to be really, really fair.
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Of course not. They are standing on that scale. That is why there are so many criminals on the USSC.
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This happens all the time when you deal with any bureaucracy.
Do you really need to do the things that the bureaucracy says you need to do? It's never really clear, unless the process is explicitly spelled out. You do what the bureaucrat says because if you're in a long-term relationship with the bureaucracy you need to. And even if the steps are explicit you sometimes do what the bureaucracy wants because it makes life easier.
I doubt any readers here actually deal with government bureaucracies on a daily basis, because they you did you would understand the telco's position.
It's unclear what remedy the telcos are looking for here either. Do they want a refund and want to take the government to court to contest the fine?
What's also sort of odd is that this case goes against the idea of regulatory capture. If the telcos really controlled the FCC then why would they be doing this? Is this some kind of way to neutralize the FCC's enforcement power?
Do you really need to do the things that the bureaucracy says you need to do? It's never really clear, unless the process is explicitly spelled out. You do what the bureaucrat says because if you're in a long-term relationship with the bureaucracy you need to. And even if the steps are explicit you sometimes do what the bureaucracy wants because it makes life easier.
I doubt any readers here actually deal with government bureaucracies on a daily basis, because they you did you would understand the telco's position.
It's unclear what remedy the telcos are looking for here either. Do they want a refund and want to take the government to court to contest the fine?
What's also sort of odd is that this case goes against the idea of regulatory capture. If the telcos really controlled the FCC then why would they be doing this? Is this some kind of way to neutralize the FCC's enforcement power?
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The screaming for a right to a jury trial from companies who regularly put mandatory arbitration clauses in all their consumer facing agreements makes me want to tell them to go cry me a river.
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Well, only if you're a rich, white, "Christian" (cough), outwardly heterosexual Republican male.
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All tickets I have seen say you can either pay your fine OR show up in court for a trial. Now the system often biases the defendant toward paying the fine and skipping the trial by including court costs if you lose the trial. Pretty sure that if you pay the fine, part of the process is you plead guilty. Paying the fine without a trial is in effect, a plea deal without a lawyer involved.
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In South Africa, traffic fines are admission of guilt fines. So you either pay the fine and admit you are guilty, or go to the courts and argue your innocence in front of a magistrate. Then the fine becomes a court-imposed penalty if you lose.
Depending on the wording of the statute, this sounds like the FCC fines originally acted in a similar manner, but then morphed into an imposed penalty after the 2003 AT&T case which followed the logic of pay first, then appeal, rather than appeal then pay.
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chateauarusi
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Well, except that the current proceeding seems to be suggesting a model where the police officer gives you a ticket and you are free to ignore it unless and until the state drags you into court and gets a jury to agree that, yeah, you really do need to pay the fine.
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Either $100m is a lot of money for a bureaucratic oversight.
The FCC did not have a problem with selling real time location data. The FCC has a problem with a missing line in the small print. Just tell the customers to either agree or terminate their contracts, and selling the data is no longer a problem.
The FCC did not have a problem with selling real time location data. The FCC has a problem with a missing line in the small print. Just tell the customers to either agree or terminate their contracts, and selling the data is no longer a problem.
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My knowledge on this comes purely from YT LegalEagle, but if memory serves me right there are upper limits on financial penalties jurors can dish out. The jurors may decide on a larger sum, but that will be capped by the court.
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SCOTUS loves to throw out jury awards. See the Exxon Valdez settlement that was making its way through the courts for 20 years. Once SCOTUS got involved it was drastically cut down.
"You can't make fines bvinding unless a jury in involved...and BTW we will override those jury fines anyway"
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This is not a small thing for a lot of us. I do not want my data sold. I exercise my right to be forgotten, I refuse every tracking site I can and run incognito much of the time, I absolutely don't go anywhere near Facebook. Companies can ignore me, but at least they're in contravention of GDPR if they do so.
Companies that do not acknowledge the legal rights of their customers can get what they deserve, even if someone thinks "ooh, I know how we can make money by screwing over our users". It may not occur to them to care about their private information being bought and sold, but they need to be aware that others are less willing, and any modicum of corporate training should have covered that.
I wonder if they have internal records of which managers have their heads on the block for this one?
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Those limits apply to punitive damages in a tort, which are typically capped at 3x actual damages.
But anyway in this situation the jury wouldn't be determining the penalty.
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You'd get voir dired out of there so fast your ass wouldn't catch up to your head for a week.
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I dunno about that - could the ISP really get all their customers removed for cause? Because there aren't enough peremptories in the world to give an ISP a jury that doesn't hate them otherwise.
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I'd love to see this go to jury trial. Let Verizon try to defend selling the data of the people sitting in front of them.
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