Feds Bar Microsoft, Adobe, Others From Visa Program

By Britain Eakin

Vice President JD Vance said Thursday that the Trump administration has suspended Microsoft, Adobe and other technology companies from utilizing a program that allows H-1B visa holders to apply for green cards, saying Microsoft in particular has "abused" the system.

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Analysis

USPTO Plan To Limit AIA Reviews Is In White House's Hands

By Ryan Davis

Rules proposed by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to place new limits on patent challenges are being scrutinized by a White House agency, which has held dozens of meetings with groups advocating for and against the plan in recent weeks.

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New USPTO GC Vows Government Won't 'Micromanage' IP

By Bonnie Eslinger

John Duffy, the new U.S. Patent and Trademark Office general counsel and acting solicitor, told patent professionals gathered in San Francisco on Thursday that the economic use of patent rights is best handled by the private sector and that governments here and elsewhere shouldn't "micromanage the commerce of intellectual properties."

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High Court Puts 4th Circ. Political Ad Rate Ruling On Ice

By Christopher Cole

The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday stayed a Fourth Circuit ruling that directed the Federal Communications Commission to review an agency staff decision requiring broadcasters charge the lowest political ad rates for committees tied to candidates.

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Gov't Attys Could Face Sanctions Over AI Use Omissions

By Madeline Lyskawa

A U.S. Court of Federal Claims judge has ordered four government attorneys to explain why they shouldn't be sanctioned for making factual misrepresentations about the U.S. Army's use of artificial intelligence to evaluate contract proposals.

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Fed. Circ. Told Trade Secret Suit 'Never' Should've Been Filed

By Ivan Moreno

A Federal Circuit panel focused Thursday on when a business analytics software company's unsuccessful trade secret case against a rival may have crossed the line into bad faith litigation, warranting nearly $2.8 million in attorney fees from a Utah federal judge.

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USA Today Adds To Pile Of Newspaper Suits Against OpenAI

By Elliot Weld

USA Today Co. Inc. and several of its subsidiary newspapers accused OpenAI on Thursday in New York federal court of using their copyrighted news content to train ChatGPT, adding to a heap of lawsuits filed by large and small newspapers claiming the company made free use of content it should have paid for.

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Lawmakers Push For Protections In $10M Spirit Data Sale

By Kelcey Caulder

More than 120 mostly Democratic lawmakers raised concerns Thursday about the proposed $10 million sale of Spirit Airlines' internal data to Google for artificial intelligence training, saying the sale would involve an "extraordinary volume" of internal records containing individuals' sensitive information.

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Analysis

New Fraud Division Flexes Might In Latest Enforcement Policy

By Phillip Bantz

The National Fraud Enforcement Division's new corporate enforcement policy emphasizes the quick pursuit of certain types of fraud through data analysis and staff resources, expands the target list beyond traditional healthcare providers and highlights the division's growing dominance within the U.S. Department of Justice, experts say.

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Global Trade More Resilient Than Expected In 2026, WTO Says

By Jack McLoone

The global market has largely weathered conflicts in the Middle East and other disruptions better than expected so far in 2026 thanks to the growth of artificial intelligence, the World Trade Organization said Thursday, revising upward some of its global trade growth projections.

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FTC's Meador Urges EU To Adopt Case-By-Case Enforcement

By Bryan Koenig

Federal Trade Commission member Mark Meador on Thursday argued digital market rules in the U.K. and the European Union undermine international cooperation with U.S. antitrust and consumer protection enforcers, in the latest Trump administration admonishment of the policies.

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FCC Dem Slams 'Dark Money' Plan For Political Robocalls

By Nadia Dreid

The FCC spends a lot of time trying to do something about the billions of illegal robocalls Americans are pelted with every month, but the agency is currently considering a proposal to relax the current rules on political robocalls ahead of the November midterms — to the chagrin of the commission's lone Democrat.

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IP Rights Group Urges Against Litigation Funding Disclosure

By Elliot Weld

An inventor rights advocacy group has told a federal courts rules committee that requiring the disclosure of who is funding civil litigation would put independent inventors at a disadvantage when trying to enforce patents against a larger company.

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Top Groups Lobbying The FCC

By Christopher Cole

Lobbying efforts at the Federal Communications Commission spiked in September as companies and interest groups looked to sway FCC policies on issues such as modernizing the phone networks, Lifeline reform, environmental rules, satellite spectrum and more.

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Hotel Guest Argues Info Exchange Fight Fits Digital Era

By Lauraann Wood

The give-to-get nature of a software service allowing luxury hotels to access competitors' occupancy data only upon contributing their own should be enough to plausibly outline an age-old illegal information exchange in the more modern digital era, a hotel guest told the Seventh Circuit.

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CIT Unconvinced By Commerce's Landing Gear Scope Finding

By Jack McLoone

The U.S. Department of Commerce's finding that certain imported landing gear subassemblies are in the scope of duty orders on Chinese chassis doesn't mesh with the plain language of the orders, the U.S. Court of International Trade ruled.

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Wash. Justices Say Privacy Act Doesn't Bar Hospital Pixel Use

By Rachel Riley

The Washington State Supreme Court said Thursday the state's privacy act does not prohibit Seattle Children's Hospital from using web analytics tool Meta Pixel on its public-facing website, rejecting a group of parents' allegations that their browsing and search activity was illegally intercepted and sent to the Facebook parent company.

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Zoox Investors, Directors Clash Over Amazon Deal Class

By Jarek Rutz

The Delaware Chancery Court on Thursday took under advisement a bid to certify a class of former Zoox Inc. common stockholders challenging Amazon.com Inc.'s $1.3 billion acquisition of the autonomous vehicle company, after hearing arguments over whether releases signed by most proposed class members prevent the case from proceeding on a classwide basis.

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Zillow Says Court Misread Case Law In Realtors' Antitrust Suit

By Rachel Riley

Zillow urged a Washington federal judge Thursday to revisit a recent ruling advancing a proposed class action accusing it of gatekeeping referrals to pressure realtors into buying its software and promoting its home loan services, contending the court cited inapplicable cases when considering antitrust standing and other key issues.

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Ameriprise Says Data Breach Suit Leans On Speculative Harm

By Sydney Price

Ameriprise Financial Inc. on Thursday asked a Minnesota federal court to dismiss a proposed class action from consumers accusing it of failing to safeguard their data from cybercriminals in a March breach, arguing the suit's plaintiffs do not allege that their data was involved in the incident.

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Utility Giant Southern Co. Sued Over Recent Data Breach

By Kelcey Caulder

The Southern Co. has been hit with a proposed class action in Georgia federal court, accusing the utility holding company of failing to adequately protect hundreds of thousands of customers' personal information during a recent cyberattack.

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SpaceXAI's Grok Sued For Breaking Ill. Law With Face Scans

By Allison Grande

The Grok chatbot operated by Elon Musk's artificial intelligence company is illegally collecting and storing the biometric data of users who upload photos of their faces to generate edited images, according to a proposed class action filed in Illinois federal court.

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Disney, ESPN Sued Over Streaming Patents By Korean Group

By Adam Lidgett

A South Korean government research institution and three universities have sued Disney, Hulu and ESPN in Delaware federal court claiming part of their ways of providing videos infringes a series of streaming patents.

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Suit Alleges Compass Sought 'Back Channel' In DOJ Review

By Nate Beck

A shareholder is alleging in New York federal court that Compass sought to evade regulatory review of its $1.6 billion merger with Anywhere Real Estate by hiring an attorney connected to the Trump administration to push the deal through six months ahead of time.

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Colo. Landowners Sue To Block Data Center

By Benjamin Morse

Colorado landowners sued Weld County and a data center developer, alleging that the county unlawfully approved the first phase of what they say will be the state's largest data center despite concerns about its water and electricity needs, noise pollution and violations of public meeting requirements.

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Spectrum Equity Clinches Its Largest Fund Ever At $2.5B

By Jade Martinez-Pogue

Growth equity firm Spectrum Equity on Thursday revealed that it has wrapped its 11th fund after securing $2.5 billion in investor commitments.

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Deals Rumor Mill

SpaceX, DeepSeek And Anthropic Top Week's Deal Rumors

By Al Barbarino

SpaceX is seeking financing to purchase $40 billion of Nvidia microchips, Chinese AI company DeepSeek is close to securing a $12 billion funding round, and Anthropic could launch its initial public offering before Thanksgiving. In other reports, Barbie maker Mattel is facing increased pressure to sell after a rough run on the stock market. 

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Air Force Licenses Drone Capture Patent To AI Tech Co.

By Adam Lidgett

The U.S. Air Force is licensing one of its patents meant to trap drones and disarm their communication systems to an artificial intelligence space and defense infrastructure company to evaluate its use across various applications.

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Senators Say Ticket Brokers Can't Pry Into Their Emails

By Nadia Dreid

Two U.S. senators have told a Maryland federal court that a ticket broker cannot force them and their staff to comb through their communications "in the hope of uncovering stray remarks" to support the company's interpretation of the law the FTC is suing it for violating.

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DOJ Clears Mobile Parking Payment Merger

By Nadia Dreid

The Justice Department is waving through a merger between two mobile parking payment companies after finding that their union wouldn't pose a problem for competition within the United States.

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Duke Energy, Tech Giants Ink Data Center Cost Deal

By Gina Kim

Duke Energy announced on Wednesday that it has reached a deal with North Carolina regulators, Amazon, Meta, Microsoft, Google and others to beef up existing protections to ensure ratepayers won't be burdened with costs incurred from data centers and other large-load customers in the Tar Heel State. 

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Trucking Co. Owner Gets 2 Years For $3.5M Amazon Fraud

By Brian Steele

A Connecticut man who admitted to swindling $3.5 million from Amazon.com Inc. by tricking the online retailer into believing he had completed transportation jobs must serve two years in prison, a federal judge has ruled.

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DA Looks To Stifle Subpoena In NC Digital Court Class Claims

By Hayley Fowler

A local district attorney is seeking to quash a subpoena in a proposed class action alleging glitches in North Carolina's electronic court system led to scores of individuals being wrongfully arrested or detained, calling the request "overly broad" and "unduly burdensome."

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DOJ Urges Justices To Keep Anti-ICE Activist Detained Pretrial

By Brandon Lowrey

Federal prosecutors on Thursday urged the U.S. Supreme Court to leave in place a Sixth Circuit ruling that a self-described "antifa" member must remain in jail pending trial on charges that he cyberstalked and threatened a social-media supporter of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

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Procopio Hires Ex-Perkins Coie IP Attorney As Partner In Calif.

By Gina Kim

Procopio Cory Hargreaves & Savitch LLP announced on Thursday it has hired a former Perkins Coie intellectual property veteran to join the firm's Del Mar Heights, California, office as a partner.

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Changing Strategies To Protect Your Autonomous AI's IP

After Insilico recently named only human inventors on a patent application for an autonomous artificial intelligence's drug discovery, companies should take concrete steps to preserve the strongest possible intellectual property protection for AI-assisted work, including documenting human contributions and strengthening trade secret controls, says Stephen Ball at Husch Blackwell.

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How AI Is Reshaping The Structure Of Crypto Venture Deals

As founders at the intersection of crypto and artificial intelligence increasingly face capital-raising quandaries, parties structuring crypto venture deals should weigh how equity, token and hybrid financings allocate value to avoid tricky contractual governance and fiduciary law questions down the line, say attorneys at Cahill Gordon.

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IDScan Data Breach Puts Spotlight On Vendor Oversight

A recently reported breach that exposed millions of identification documents held by IDScan.net highlights the liability risks for businesses that contract with third-party identity processors, and emphasizes the importance of auditing vendors' data retention practices, say attorneys at Tucker Ellis.

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Zillow-Redfin Settlement Spotlights Nontraditional-Deal Risk

The Federal Trade Commission's recent settlement with Zillow and Redfin serves as a reminder that authorities are increasingly interested in challenging nontraditional transaction structures that effectively eliminate a market participant, which includes some exclusivity arrangements, say attorneys at Freshfields.

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Series

Mentalism Makes Me A Better Lawyer

Convincing strangers I can read their minds may seem like an unusual second career for a legal practitioner, but both disciplines share several important requirements, including trust and preparation, says Warren Biro at Manatt.

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Sheppard Mullin Hit With Class Action Over Data Breach

By Jake Maher

A former Sheppard Mullin Richter & Hampton LLP paralegal launched a proposed class action against the firm in California federal court on Wednesday over a cyberattack it had in August, in which she says at least 1,000 people's names and Social Security numbers were stolen.

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Cornell Defendant Seeks To Nix James As Special Prosecutor

By Andrea Keckley

One of the seven men accused of drugging and raping a fellow Cornell University student at a fraternity home has asked a New York state court to void Gov. Kathy Hochul's appointment of New York Attorney General Letitia James as special prosecutor in the case.

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Split Congress Could Spur Competing Probes, Cleary Finds

By Courtney Bublé

If the new year brings an era of divided Congress, then "dueling investigations" into the same topics should be expected, Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton LLP said in a report it released Thursday.

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Fla. Judge Says Oct. 7 Attack Was 'Inflection Point' For U.S.

By David Minsky

U.S. District Judge Roy K. Altman addressed a small group of attorneys in a Florida law office to speak on his book about the October 2023 Hamas-led attack on Israel, saying public debate over facts surrounding the event and underlying feud has reached an "inflection point" in America.

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Buzbee Faces $970K Fee Bid In Dismissed Conspiracy Cases

By Lynn LaRowe

A Mississippi lawyer is asking a Texas state court to award her more than $970,000 in fees after defeating claims that she and her law firm conspired with rapper Shawn "Jay-Z" Carter and Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan LLP to retaliate against prominent Houston plaintiffs attorney Tony Buzbee and two of his former clients.

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Dems Says GOP Broke Senate Rules In Jack Smith Hearing

By Courtney Bublé

The Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee have accused Republicans of violating committee rules during a hearing last week with former special counsel Jack Smith.

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