Plaintiff Fighting Cablevision Dismissal Motion in CFAA Claim
"A vaguely worded statement buried" in the last paragraph of terms and conditions and not part of the uniform service contract isn't adequate disclosure of public Wi-Fi hot spots being broadcast from customers' homes, said a response (in PACER) filed…
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Monday in U.S. District Court in Central Islip, New York, in opposition to a motion to dismiss a suit against the cable ISP and parent Altice. Plaintiff Paul Jensen of Brooklyn said Cablevision/Altice claims the Wi-Fi policy is divulged in the general terms and conditions of service, but the link provided in the motion to dismiss redirects people to another page with another set of links to 22 different terms of service, with the fourth one down directing people to yet another web page giving details about Optimum Online Service operating as a wireless hot spot. Jensen said parent companies aren't automatically liable for subsidiaries' actions, but the parents can be found liable where the actions were done at the parent's direction, and Altice controls Cablevision decision-making. Jensen said Cablevision/Altice is wrong when it argues that each use of a customer's Optimum router is a distinct alleged offense and none of those individually reaches the $5,000 damages threshold, since courts have found that damages to a class as a whole can be aggregated to meet that $5,000 Computer Fraud and Abuse Act threshold. Altice didn't comment Tuesday.