eDiscovery Case Law: Twitter Seeks to Succeed Where Defendant Failed

http://ow.ly/aQswu

An article by Doug Austin posted on the eDiscovery Daily Blog.

This article discusses a recent case in which Twitter has objected to a court ordered subpoena, and the article discusses the three grounds that Twitter relied upon for their motion to quash the subpoena.

The article states, "In People v. Harris, No. 2011NY080152 (N.Y. Crim. Ct.), Twitter opened its brief by indicating that section 2703(d) of the Stored Communications Act provides that “[a] court issuing an order pursuant to this section, on a motion made promptly by the service provider, may quash or modify such order, if. . . compliance with such order otherwise would cause an undue burden on such provider." Twitter identified three reasons that it argued the order compelling its production of the defendant’s information imposes an undue burden."

The article provides discussion regarding the 3 grounds that Twitter relied upon for their motion to quash.  The 3 reasons briefly summarized are as follows:

1. Twitter contended that the court’s ruling that the defendant has no proprietary interest in the requested information (and therefore no standing to challenge the subpoena), was in conflict to Twitter’s Terms of Service.
2. Twitter also claimed that the order forces it to “violate federal law” and noted that the Stored Communications Act (SCA) has been held to violate the Fourth Amendment “to the extent that it requires providers to disclose the contents of communications in response to anything less than a search warrant.
3. Twitter also argued that “a criminal litigant cannot compel production of documents from a California resident like Twitter without presenting the appropriate certification to a California court, scheduling a hearing and obtaining a California subpoena for production.

The article provides a link to another article on the same blog which addresses a portion of this issue related to the first rationale of Twitter's objection.  The article also provides citations of the statutes Twitter is relying upon, and case law cited by Twitter.

P.S.  This will be an important decision which will add some clarity as to the proper means that must be followed in order to legally obtain information from social media networks such as Twitter.  Will Twitter's 2nd argument regarding the requirement for a search warrant in order to comply with the SCA ring true?