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Four students bring a claim against iParadigm to prevent their works (papers) from being archived by the company; iParadigm brings action against one student who gained unauthorized access. Cases of Interest >  Cyberlaw >  Copyright

A.V. ex rel. Vanderhye v. iParadigms, LLC

A.V. ex rel. Vanderhye v. iParadigms, LLC

2009 WL 1015145

Decided April 16, 2009.

Facts: Four high school students have brought copyright infringement claims against iParadigms (Turnitin), a computer program that evaluates students' papers to discover potential plagiarism. Iparadigms operates by archiving students' papers and then using an algorithm produces an “originality report.” The originality report shows the likelihood that the paper was plagiarized.
Further, to use iParadigm's Tunitin website the students must agree through a clickwrap agreement to the terms of agreement of Turnitin. Also, to use turnitin the student is provided with a class i.d. and password. One student, who copyrighted his papers, used a college level password to submit papers; therefore, he circumvented and obtained unauthorized access to Turnitin. Turnitin then spent many hours to figure out how the plaintiff obtained access and correct the problem.

Procedural History: The four students have brought copyright infringement claims against iParadigm for archiving their papers; iParadigm has brought a counterclaim against the student who gained unauthorized access to Turnitin under 18 U.S.C 1030 (a)(5)(iii) & (B)(1) and Virginia Computer Crimes Act.

Holding: Turnitin did infringe on students' copyright rights, but has a valid fair use defense. Turnitin satisfies the four factors of the fair use doctrine because 1) Turnitin uses the papers in a transformative nature, because they do not use the papers for factual purposes but rather to prevent plagiarism. 2) the author's creativity is not diminished. While the papers are unpublished, Turnitin does not discourage creativity. Turnitin uses computers to review and read the papers therefore they are not read nor published by Turnitin. 3) The amount used does not favor either party because while Turnitin uses the whole paper, it is not using the paper for the same reason of the paper. 4) Marketability is not effected ( plaintiffs used an unique theory that their paper would not be available to market to other high school students but all plaintiffs agreed that this would be dishonest.). Therefore, Turnitin was protected by the fair use defense.

The counterclaim that the district court dismissed, the appeal court found that under 18 U.S.C. 1030 (g) a party can recover for a “loss” that is a result of “any reasonable cost to any victim, INCLUDING THE COST OF RESPONDING TO AN OFFENSE.” Therefore, the case is remanded for potential recovery.

The final counterclaim under the Virginia Computer Crimes Act was decided on the same basis of the 1030 claim and therefore remanded back to district court.

Critical Analysis: This case was a very interesting case that seemed to review the whole semester of Cyberlaw. I feel the Court of Appeals correctly applied the fair use defense, and came to the right conclusion on the Copyright Infringement claims. However, I do not think any Federal Circuit has correctly applied 1030 claims, because the courts use a but-for test rather than actual damages test. I think therefore the district court ruling should be upheld that dismissed the 1030 claim and Virginia Computer Crimes Act.
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