> Whether Section 230(c)(1) of the Communications Decency Act immunizes interactive computer services when they make targeted recommendations of information provided by another information content provider, or only limits the liability of interactive computer services when they engage in traditional editorial functions (such as deciding whether to display or withdraw) with regard to such information.
The background is that the families of a victim of a terrorist attack are suing Google for hosting an ISIS recruitment video on Youtube, for which Google has clear and undisputed immunity because of §230, and the plaintiffs are trying to find any argument they can stand on to make the suit stick (they've lost at all lower levels of the court).
What I quoted above was the explicit question presented to SCOTUS, but from reading some of the actual briefs, there's almost no discussion of this actual question, with everyone instead wanting to discuss §230 as a whole and not its narrow application to recommendation content.
Of the briefs I did skim, I liked the US solicitor general's position the best: recommendations are not protected by §230, but it's not enough to say that recommendation engine produced objectionable content, since the content itself is protected. Essentially, the recommendation would have to be in some way unreasonable, and the burden of that unreasonability is presumably on the plaintiff's part, and these plaintiffs are clearly unable or unwilling to properly make those allegations.
> Whether Section 230(c)(1) of the Communications Decency Act immunizes interactive computer services when they make targeted recommendations of information provided by another information content provider, or only limits the liability of interactive computer services when they engage in traditional editorial functions (such as deciding whether to display or withdraw) with regard to such information.
The background is that the families of a victim of a terrorist attack are suing Google for hosting an ISIS recruitment video on Youtube, for which Google has clear and undisputed immunity because of §230, and the plaintiffs are trying to find any argument they can stand on to make the suit stick (they've lost at all lower levels of the court).
What I quoted above was the explicit question presented to SCOTUS, but from reading some of the actual briefs, there's almost no discussion of this actual question, with everyone instead wanting to discuss §230 as a whole and not its narrow application to recommendation content.
Of the briefs I did skim, I liked the US solicitor general's position the best: recommendations are not protected by §230, but it's not enough to say that recommendation engine produced objectionable content, since the content itself is protected. Essentially, the recommendation would have to be in some way unreasonable, and the burden of that unreasonability is presumably on the plaintiff's part, and these plaintiffs are clearly unable or unwilling to properly make those allegations.