Google and Waze Cited for Traffic Data Theft in PhantomAlert Suit

blogs.wsj.com

11 points·chatmasta··6 comments

Precedent is very much against PhantomAlert. Such data simply isn't copyrightable. See Feist Publications, Inc., v. Rural Telephone Service Co., 499 U.S. 340 (1991), which involved fictitious entries in a telephone book.

Precedent for general copyright, yes, but according to other news sources and PhantomAlert comments they were in negotiations for data-sharing that fell through. The chances those weren't covered by NDAs as well as likely more stringent contractual obligations is very low, so there's a contractual element. It's very different for me to sue you over data you've scraped than for us to sign contracts covering what you're allowed to do with our data and whether you're allowed to use it at all. In my experience financial data is just about always fenced by contracts, simply trusting the guy's you've been competing to take care of you is pure incompetence.

Isn't it much more likely that random members added this data vs google copying it?

I don't know, I would think users would add those events when they saw them, not copy the information from one app to the other.

I doubt Google itself copied them, but I have no problem seeing Wazes pulling all the information in while it was a tiny company, and then their DB being dumped into Google.

According to the article, the claims are based on fake data points, which are common among publishers to catch copying.

I know. I'm assuming users saw the alert in one app, and copied it into another.

It's not always easy to actually see the cameras, I can easily imagine users just believing the other app.

Did the at least put the fake cameras in places like the middle of the ocean where it would not actually every alert anyone?

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