Welcome back for another week of What's Next, where we report on the intersection of law and technology. Here's what we've got for you today:

>> Newly released records show that police officers' use of surveillance technology on protesters might have violated a San Francisco ordinance.

>> Gibbs Law Group and Girard Sharp file more than a hundred lawsuits against a cryogenic equipment manufacturer over a product failure in a fertility clinic.

>> Steve Wozniak's lawyers say Section 230 can only take YouTube so far in defense of its failure to adequately address a cryptocurrency scheme on the platform.

Let's chat: Email me at [email protected] and follow me on Twitter at @a_lancaster.

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Announcing Two Incredible Keynote Speakers for the Women, Influence & Power in Law Conference

WIPL is known for having some of the most engaging and energizing keynote speakers attend to share their thoughts, experiences, war stories and tips on effective leadership. And this year is no exception. This year, we are grateful to welcome two remarkable women come and inspire us: Tina Tchen, the President and CEO of the "Times Up" Legal Defense Fund and Paula Boggs, Founder of Boggs Media LLC and Former Executive Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary, Law and Corporate Affairs at Starbucks from 2002-2012. READ MORE

Build the Surveillance Infrastructure, And They Will Come

In a fit of quarantine inspiration, I have decided to write a screenplay that's sort of a 2020 "Field of Dreams." But instead of the baseball diamond in an Iowa cornfield, it's a network of surveillance cameras in a San Francisco shopping district. The baseball players are San Francisco police officers, and hunky farmer Kevin Costner, who hears the words "If you build it, he will come," will be replaced, in true Bay Area fashion, by a cryptocurrency entrepreneur.

But until my dramatization is available for Netflix binging, here's the real story.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation released records this week showing that SFPD surveilled protesters in real time for about a week between May and June with hundreds of security cameras. In a May 31 email to the Union Square Business Improvement District, Officer Oliver Lim says that he was directed by his captain to ask for access to the cameras "to monitor the potential violence today."

The district is one of 18 "community benefit districts" in the city that use nonprofits to administer funds to improve quality of life in certain neighborhoods. Chris Larsen, co-founder of fintech company Ripple Labs, has helped pay for hundreds of the cameras that now stretch across 135 blocks, according to an article from The New York Times released earlier this month.

But permission to access the cameras might not have been solely the district's to give. Last June, San Francisco passed a law requiring city departments to first get approval from the Board of Supervisors before using or acquiring non-city owned surveillance tech in certain circumstances.

Deirdre Mulligan, associate professor at Berkeley's School of Information and faculty directory for its Center for Law and Technology, said the goal of the city ordinance is to reinsert public oversight into surveillance operations. Mulligan said police departments are getting a hold of surveillance technology through Department of Homeland Security block grants, drug forfeiture money or service contracts through companies, such as Amazon. "We want to have public oversight, because, since these contracts are not tied to public purse strings, they're being onboarded without vetting," she said.

Dave Maass, senior investigative researcher for the EFF, said in an email that this might be the first major test of the surveillance ordinance.

"Undisclosed surveillance of protesters through a sophisticated camera network is exactly the type of threat to civil liberties that the law was designed to prevent," Maas said.

Karin Flood, executive director of the Union Square Business Improvement District, said in an email statement that the district shared SFPD's concern about potential violence amid the protests.

"Thus, in response to their request, we granted the SFPD access to the BID's records and security camera network system pursuant to our policies, which are available to the public," Flood said. "Thankfully, we are not aware of anyone injured during the protests, but our concern was borne out by tens of millions of dollars in damage done to already struggling Union Square businesses. We hope that those few violent looters who committed senseless acts of vandalism will be brought to justice." San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin, which offered support for law enforcement's use of the camera network in The New York Times article, did not respond to a request for comment Tuesday.

SFPD and the City Attorney's Office also did not return requests for comment.

A cryopreservation tank at Pacific Fertility Center in San Francisco imploded in March 2018. Photo: Courtesy Photo

A Cryogenic Implosion at Fertility Clinic Leads to Explosion of Cases

It's been a busy week for the Gibbs Law Group and Girard Sharp, whose recent work could help map out the largely unchartered territory of legal rights for patients using reproductive technology. The firms have filed 133 cases against a cryogenic tank manufacturer whose product imploded in a San Francisco fertility clinic two years ago, compromising the viability of the 2,500 patient embryos and 1,500 eggs inside the tank.

The lawsuits against Georgia-based Chart Inc. come after U.S. Magistrate Judge Jacqueline Scott Corley of the Northern District of California denied certification to an estimated class of 600 individuals affected by the failure.

In that case, In re: Pacific Fertility Center Litigation, Corley wrote in a July 23 order that individual cases would be superior. She found that much of the evidence presented in a general causation trial would have to be presented again in individual trials and the "potential amount of damages at stake, as well as the personal and private nature of the claims, each absent class member has a strong interest in individually prosecuting an action should the member so choose."

On Monday, the two firms motioned to relate their 133 cases to the In re: Pacific Fertility Center Litigation.

"All plaintiffs In Re Pacific Fertility Center Litigation and the 133 lawsuits are clients of Pacific Fertility Center and had either frozen eggs or embryos stored in a single cryopreservation tank manufactured by Chart Inc., known as Tank 4," they wrote, alongside attorneys from Peiffer Wolf Carr & Kane, who had helped litigate the proposed class action. "Each action seeks to hold Chart liable for the failure of Tank 4 on March 4, 2018, which resulted in damage to the eggs and embryos stored within the tank. Chart is the only defendant named in each of the actions."

Image from complaint where Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak is suing YouTube and parent company Google for failing to shut down cryptocurrency schemes that bear his likeness on the platform.

Steve Wozniak Takes on YouTube, Google Over Cryptocurrency Giveaway Scheme

Steve Wozniak sued YouTube for failing to address a cryptocurrency giveaway scam that uses images and videos of the Apple co-founder to entice viewers to send in their Bitcoin with an ominous guarantee to receive twice as much in return.

Wozniak isn't the only entrepreneur whose likeness has been co-opted to swindle cryptocurrency investors out of their digital assets. Scammers have also invoked Bill Gates, Elon Musk, Dell Technologies' Michael Dell, and personal finance educator Robert Kiyosaki, according to a complaint filed Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy.

Wozniak also isn't the first tech icon to sue over the scam. In April, Boies Schiller Flexner represented Ripple Labs and CEO Bradley Garlinghouse in a trademark infringement suit against YouTube for failing to shut down the scheme.

Last week, YouTube's counsel at Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati filed a motion to dismiss the Ripple Labs complaint, in part, because of the platform's Section 230 immunity afforded by the Communications Decency Act.

"They do not contend (nor could they) that YouTube perpetrated the fraud or created any of the scam content," YouTube's attorneys wrote. "Instead, Plaintiffs wish to hold YouTube liable for not acting more aggressively to monitor, block, and remove the material that third-party fraudsters have posted. Section 230 categorically bars such claims and requires dismissal with prejudice of Plaintiffs' state-law causes of action."

Wozniak's lawyers said Section 230 "continues to play a vital and important role in ensuring free and open expression and debate on the Internet with a minimum of government regulation," in the complaint. But in a phone interview, Cotchett Pitre's Brian Danitz headed off any arguments regarding the statute. Section 230 does not protect the kind of misconduct that is alleged in the complaint, he said.

In a press conference last week, Joseph Cotchett, asked lawmakers to question Google CEO Sundar Pichai about why they haven't taken effective actions to prevent the scheme when he testifies before Congress alongside a gaggle of tech executives today.

We'll see if Washington was listening.

On the Radar

FTC Mirrors New York DFS With Potentially Costly Cybersecurity Proposal Willkie Farr & Gallagher financial services and cybersecurity of counsel Richard Borden noted that many companies could incur such costs for the first time. "You've got information security people at many of these institutions that do a really good job at protecting the company and data. But that is not everywhere," Borden said. "There may be companies that haven't been subject to something like this before that are going to be, and that would be a burden on them." Read more from Victoria Hudgins here.

Google Triumphs in 'Right to be Forgotten' Cases in Germany The data protection law GDPR "requires a comprehensive weighing of fundamental rights, which must be carried out on the basis of all relevant circumstances of the individual case and taking into account the seriousness of the encroachment on the fundamental rights of the person concerned on the one hand, the basic rights of the defendant, the interests of its users and the public as well as the basic rights of the providers of the contents proven in the objected result links on the other hand," the court said in the statement. Read more from Eva von Schaper here.

How GDPR Has Spawned a Global Data Law Revolution "[Other nations] see the GDPR as the quintessential data law, not so much because it enshrines values we've held dear for so long, but because it has huge simplification power," says a data partner at a U.S. firm. "And laws that are simple, and generally translate into meaningful on the ground regulation are those that do best and achieve their outcomes.The GDPR does this." Read more from Krishnan Nair here.

IBM Springs Patent Surprise on Zillow—and Judge Zilly During a virtual status conference Thursday, Zilly said he was "quite surprised, even a little shocked," that IBM would file the new suit, without advance notice, while the lawyers were in the midst of trying to make the first case more manageable. Read more from Scott Graham here.

Thanks for reading. We will be back next week with more What's Next. Stay safe and healthy, everyone.