Google, Tech Industry Join Cloudflare Fight Against Contempt Charge

Google and tech industry interests are backing Cloudflare in its fight against being found in contempt of the terms of a permanent injunction against a video privacy site/Cloudflare customer (see 2206160024). Google said it's conferring with counsel for the plaintiffs, a variety of Israeli video content companies that sued pirate site Israel.TV, in advance of a possible motion to modify or dissolve the injunctions, in a letter (docket 21-cv-11024) dated Thursday to U.S. District Judge Katherine Polk Failla of Manhattan. It said it's concerned that injunctions bind the parties, their agents and others participating with them, but the injunctions in this case bid various third parties who fall outside those categories, "including Google." Nor do the injunctions make clear what the bound parties are supposed to do or not do, it said. The Electronic Frontier Foundation and the Computer & Communications Industry Association, in a request to file an amicus brief in opposition to the contempt motion, said they "are greatly concerned by the possible consequences that a finding of contempt, and any enforcement of the underlying injunction against unaffiliated non-party online service providers, will have on the due process rights of those service providers, and on the free speech and due process rights of Internet users generally." They said in the case of a copyright infringement suit against a website operator, proceedings against unaffiliated service providers "present a particular danger of blocking lawful and constitutionally protected speech, and of imposing unfair and unnecessary compliance burdens." Outside counsel for the video content companies didn't comment Friday.