Intellectual Property Law

Craigslist Demands Apology From South Carolina Attorney General

By mattz

Craigslist CEO Jim Buckmaster today posted a strongly-worded response to South Carolina Attorney General Henry McMaster's ongoing legally-baseless threats to bring criminal charges against him and founder Craig Newmark, culminating in a request for a long-overdue apology. Buckmaster is exactly right. As we and many others have noted, craigslist was never at risk of incurring criminal liability for material posted by their users because Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act clearly protects them. Instead, McMaster and the other AGs took advantage of craigslist's previously-demonstrated interest in working with law enforcement to address any legitimate concerns and rewarded such voluntary cooperation with even more belligerent posturing. McMaster's threat to prosecute them knowing full well that craigslist is absolutely protected by federal law was, as Buckmaster correctly put it, "simply beyond the pale."

Full post as published by Electronic Freedom Foundation - Deep Links on May 18, 2009 (boomark / email).