So they want to forbid a startup to scrap the personal data of their users as if Linkedin was the only company allowed to have access to this data.
I mean it is completely crazy, it is not LinkedIn data it is OUR data
U.S. judge says LinkedIn cannot block startup from public profile data
41–50 of 301 posts
Re: U.S. judge says LinkedIn cannot block startup from public profile data
#42This is just a preliminary injunction and the court has not even heard or ruled on this case. They just allowed HiQ to access the data while they wait for the scheduled court hearing to begin. The court may eventually rule very differently once they have heard all the evidence presented and weighed up existing applicable case law. The judge who issued this injunction - Edward Chen, is also the judge presiding over th…
"This is just a preliminary injunction and the court has not even heard or ruled on this case"
This is not quite right. One of the requirements to get a PI is a likelihood of success on the merits ;)
Re: U.S. judge says LinkedIn cannot block startup from public profile data
#43This seems very at-odds with previous rulings (specifically, relating to craigslists many past dealings). Strikes me as being very unlikely to stand up to appeal. Also, linkedin will likely modify their websites behavior (make you click to agree before you view a profile) which would create a binding 'click wrap' stopping companies from scraping them.
Appeal? The case hasn't even been heard yet. This was a preliminary injunction; it's far from over!
A preliminary injunction can be the subject of an interlocutory appeal.
Re: U.S. judge says LinkedIn cannot block startup from public profile data
#44Earlier quoted context omitted.
If a website puts something on the public internet, it should not even be aware if it is being accessed by a scraper or a human. Maybe we should just ban User Agent strings and be done with it.
You call it the "public internet" but it's most definitely not a public space or anything like it. Private entities own and operate all(most of) the servers, services and conduits, and that does need to be paid for and maintained. I'm not saying I agree with Linkedin in this particular scenario, but this is about two commercial for-profit entities arguing over money, so let's not make it about something it's not.
> Private entities own and operate all(most of) the servers, services and conduits, and that does need to be paid for and maintained
And are MORE than happy to send the content of their servers to unsolicited, uninvited, anonymous guests on mere request. No-one is forcing them to do so!
Re: U.S. judge says LinkedIn cannot block startup from public profile data
#45Being a programmer not a lawyer, I like the idea of more rights for scrapers. I don't want to see the internet partitioned away and owned by a few companies, especially when that information is often called a "public profile".
If a website puts something on the public internet, it should not even be aware if it is being accessed by a scraper or a human. Maybe we should just ban User Agent strings and be done with it.
It really doesn't take much effort to detect the majority of scrapers. Usually you do so by monitoring patterns of any given IP.
Is each request a profile page incremented (/users/1, /users/2, etc)
or dozens of requests a minute (faster than a typical user would read)?
Is static content (particularly images and CSS) being downloaded too or just the HTML content?
Sometimes the referrer HTTP header can give clues too - though you have to be careful there as that's as unreliable as the user agent header.
However if you're really paranoid about scrapers you can also throw in some honeypots. eg a fake user (/users/13) which is a user account that doesn't exist so that page wouldn't have any links from within your site. ie you only reach it if you're incrementing through the user IDs. Or perhaps a link within your HTML which doesn't render so it's only reachable via automated scripts that don't check what links are rendered inside the display view. Anyone that gets ensnared in your honeypot could then be put on a temporary IP blacklist. Though the danger of doing this is you accidentally blacklist good crawlers if you're not careful about setting appropriate robots rules.
Re: U.S. judge says LinkedIn cannot block startup from public profile data
#46This seems very at-odds with previous rulings (specifically, relating to craigslists many past dealings). Strikes me as being very unlikely to stand up to appeal. Also, linkedin will likely modify their websites behavior (make you click to agree before you view a profile) which would create a binding 'click wrap' stopping companies from scraping them.
The biggest reason why they have not done this so far is SEO. If you introduce the 'click wrap' - other crawlers like Google won't be able to crawl it, so their traffic will decrease overnight.
[deleted]
Re: U.S. judge says LinkedIn cannot block startup from public profile data
#47Earlier quoted context omitted.
Can they claim a tax credit for supporting that bandwidth usage and handling abuse?
Not needed. Cost of doing business.
I don't trust the US government to write good rights for scrapers. They can't even do computer crime sentences well.
At best, it's a burden for no solid gain for society. At worst, there will be loopholes used to DoS businesses because they can't shut down individuals due to law-given rights, and that will lead to court fights.
These rights would do nothing but save scraper authors from learning to obfuscate their actions.
Re: U.S. judge says LinkedIn cannot block startup from public profile data
#48Earlier quoted context omitted.
It gets into the incredibly murky water of how the web works. You're just issuing a request and getting things back. Sometimes in a web browser, sometimes not. But the content itself may still be copyright. You can't just take it, even though for now, the publisher/server is allowing you to view it for free. But what if you only chose to view some of the content (e.g. block ads). What if you apply your own styles to…
Maybe the whole idea of copyright is flawed and harmful?
There's nothing wrong with copyrights; 14 year copyrights.
Re: U.S. judge says LinkedIn cannot block startup from public profile data
#49Earlier quoted context omitted.
If a website puts something on the public internet, it should not even be aware if it is being accessed by a scraper or a human. Maybe we should just ban User Agent strings and be done with it.
You call it the "public internet" but it's most definitely not a public space or anything like it. Private entities own and operate all(most of) the servers, services and conduits, and that does need to be paid for and maintained. I'm not saying I agree with Linkedin in this particular scenario, but this is about two commercial for-profit entities arguing over money, so let's not make it about something it's not.
>"You call it the "public internet" but it's most definitely not a public space or anything like it."
How is it not a "pubic space"? They publish publicly visible A records for their site as well as route their public IP space to transit providers in order for the public to be able to reach their site.
Re: U.S. judge says LinkedIn cannot block startup from public profile data
#50Earlier quoted context omitted.
The biggest reason why they have not done this so far is SEO. If you introduce the 'click wrap' - other crawlers like Google won't be able to crawl it, so their traffic will decrease overnight.
They'd most certainly whitelist the google ips.
that's against TOS for Google SERPs
Showing different results to google than you do to users is called cloaking and it's not allowed