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I'm not sure if there's an entity that could be trusted to do this, but if there were, the court could simply have Yelp release the identities of Hadeed's revie
by rosser 13y ago
I'm not sure if there's an entity that could be trusted to do this, but if there were, the court could simply have Yelp release the identities of Hadeed's reviewers, and Hadeed's release its customer list, to the same (bonded, or otherwise contractually/legally obligated to maintain privacy) third party. That third party could then LEFT OUTER JOIN the lists, and release to Hadeed's the identities of any parties that have reviewed, but aren't actual customers, without also disclosing the identities of actual customers who've left legitimate negative reviews.
Of course, that might risk revealing the existence of any positive non-customer reviews, and with a company of the sort this one seems to be, I'm not willing to bet that's the empty set.
EDIT: phrasing.
- ams6110 13y agoSounds reasonable. I'm not sure how you prove that Hadeed is giving them the complete list, though.
- nardi 13y agoYeah, that's the problem. Hadeed could just strip out customers that had negative experiences from their list, and then sue those customers for defamation.
- BeoShaffer 13y agoSorta, IANAL but that would put them into perjury territory which is a huge deal if they get caught. How likely that is depends on how smart they are, but its quite possible. For example, if any of the customers didn't pay in cash thats going to leave a paper trail.
- icambron 13y agoOr has a receipt, or knows some people who could be witnesses for it, or lots of other possibilities. Filing bogus lawsuits is a tried and true intimidation tactic, but perjury is just dumb.
- gms7777 13y agoIANAL, but that seems like it would fall under perjury, and it would be way too easy for them to get caught doing it. It seems like if any of the custumers have proof that they were actually customers (e.g. credit card records), then thats the ball game.
- oakwhiz 13y agoWhat you are describing almost sounds like an opportunity to use a homomorphic cryptosystem.
- tzs 13y agoIf this were a Federal case rather than a state case, then Hadeed's lawyers could fulfill that role. It is quite common in civil cases for the lawyers for each party to be given access to confidential information of the other party, and they have a legal and ethical obligation to keep it confidential. That includes not sharing it with their client. If the lawyers see that the reviewers were actually customers, and so a defamation suit against them is not justified on the available evidence, the lawyers would have an obligation under Rule 11(b) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure to not proceed. Rule 11(b) says: ------------- Representations to the Court. By presenting to the court a pleading, written motion, or other paper—whether by signing, filing, submitting, or later advocating it—an attorney or unrepresented party certifies that to the best of the person’s knowledge, information, and belief, formed after an inquiry reasonable under the circumstances: (1) it is not being presented for any improper purpose, such as to harass, cause unnecessary delay, or needlessly increase the cost of litigation; (2) the claims, defenses, and other legal contentions are warranted by existing law or by a nonfrivolous argument for extending, modifying, or reversing existing law or for establishing new law; (3) the factual contentions have evidentiary support or, if specifically so identified, will likely have evidentiary support after a reasonable opportunity for further investigation or discovery; and (4) the denials of factual contentions are warranted on the evidence or, if specifically so identified, are reasonably based on belief or a lack of information. ------------- Lawyers take great care to follow 11(b).