From Contracts to Jurisdiction, IM Creates Legal Risks

http://ow.ly/6tppA

Article by Craig A. Olsen and Jason Bonk, appearing on law.com on the LTN webpage, from Texas Lawyer.

This article discusses the legal importance of Instant Messages.  In one example the article discusses a specific case, "In CX Digital Media Inc. v. Smoking Everywhere Inc. (2011), decided by the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida, a daylong IM chat was found sufficient to alter a pre-existing written contract..."

In another example, a court held that jurisdiction could be established through IM's, " in Deutsche Bank Securities Inc. v. Montana Board of Investments, a 2006 case involving a large financial transaction, the New York State Court of Appeals found that, through its employee's IM, the defendant "entered New York to transact business here by knowingly initiating and pursuing a negotiation with [the plaintiff's] employee in New York." Although the court recognized the defendant's other financial transactions involving New York, it nevertheless suggested that transactions conducted electronically could bring a party within the state's long-arm statute."

As the authors point out, "In the context of discovery, counsel should understand that IM conversations are not necessarily deleted or saved after a communication ends. IM users may manually or automatically save IM conversations. Depending on a company's technological restrictions, this may apply to internal, company-authorized programs and web-based programs offered by various providers."

Just as with emails, IM's leave a trail behind and are subject to discovery requests.

P.S. Social Media network posts are also subject to production pursuant to a properly tailored discovery request.