The Social Path

Could your employer confiscate your LinkedIn account if you left?

You might have heard the legal wrangling over a company that wants control of an ex-employee’s Twitter feed, but here’s a story that will really motivate you to beef up your passwords.

A company called Sawabeh Information Services is claiming it should own LinkedIn accounts used by at least two former employees. According to TechDirt, Sawabeh argues that these LinkedIn profiles are akin to rolodexes that were developed on company time.

The firm has already confiscated the account used by former partner Dr. Linda Eagle (who had apparently let other coworkers manage her account, which meant her password was easy for the company to access), but LinkedIn denied Sawabeh’s attempts to take over the account of another ex-employee.

While this debate is part of a far more complex legal battle over trade secrets and corporate backstabbing, it could end up setting an ominous precedent if Sawabeh is given control of employee LinkedIn profiles just because they were used for work.

As tech lawyer Venkat Balasubramani notes, though, there’s also the issue of LinkedIn’s terms of service, which restrict personal account access to the person who created the profile. That means Sawabeh could win in court but find the LinkedIn account closed for TOS violations.

For now, best to keep those passwords to yourself, talk to your HR manager for clarity on your company's policies and just generally avoid working for places that treat business in the information age like a game of Hungry Hungry Hippos.

David Griner is the Director of Digital Content for Luckie and Company and contributing editor for Adweek’s blog, AdFreak.com. You can reach him by e-mail or on Twitter.

Photo credit: TOKY Branding and Design on Flickr.

Ask a lawyer: Can user comments land a blogger in court?

I've been writing about blog comments for a few days now, thanks to great insights from Adweek Digital Editor Brian Morrissey and social media consultant Mack Collier. But for a slight change of pace, I wanted to look at the liability and legal issues of blog comments.

For this, I turned to Michael McSunas, a veteran attorney in the field of advertising and marketing law. He also happens to be the legal counsel for one of our clients, McKee Foods (parent company of Little Debbie), and an all-around great guy.

(Oh, and just to sell you on his street cred, Michael was the legal coordinator for those Nationwide ads featuring MC Hammer and Kevin Federline. He even negotiated the rights to the ringtones of Federline's "Rollin' VIP" song, which Michael admits was not a tremendously popular download.)

After the jump, you can get all lawyered up with Michael's feedback on issues like:

• Are businesses liable for comments on their blogs?
• Does moderation really shield you from legal trouble?
• Should a blog have a terms of use policy?

Could bloggers be sued for telling the truth?

If you've ever worked in journalism, you've probably heard the expression, "Truth is the ultimate defense against libel."

Well, maybe not, according to a new court decision that could leave countless bloggers and other citizen journalists exposed to libel suits for true statements.

In a bulletin posted today, The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press said a federal appellate court "took a unique approach to libel law by ruling that true statements can be libelous if published maliciously."

The case is Noonan v. Staples. It deals with a Staples employee whose firing for travel and expense violations was announced via executive e-mail to 1,500 employees. Alan Noonan did not question the truth of the e-mail, but he claimed it was libelous because it was sent with malicious intent.

The issue is far from settled. But the fact that it could now go before a jury has sparked serious concerns among First Amendment activists, who call it "the most dangerous libel decision in decades."

So why is this such bad news for bloggers? Because the court's decision drew a distinction between libel rules for "public figures" (ie, anyone featured in a mainstream news publication) and libel rules for everyone else.

The Reporters Committee bulletin offers this ominous quote from Rob Bertsche, a prominent First Amendment attorney in Boston:

“It's a disastrous decision for the media, and in particular for the new media: bloggers, people who post on Facebook, indeed anyone who has a website but lacks press credentials.

"That's because the mainstream media may be protected, at least haphazardly, by an assumption that if The Boston Globe writes about a topic, then by definition the topic is one of public concern. But no such presumption is likely to protect an outspoken blogger's critical remarks.” 

Today's photo credit: Meredith Farmer on Flickr.
Hat tip to my friend and former newspaper colleague, M Hoyer.