AOL, which has always had a notification policy, gives subscribers about two weeks to file a challenge. Yahoo implemented a policy last year giving posters 15 days' notice, while EarthLink Inc. recently started giving 10 days' notice. But few have fought subpoenas on subscribers' behalf. EarthLink's chief privacy officer, Les Seagraves, considers subpoenas a matter between their issuers and the subscribers. Although AOL in recent months has bucked the trend by filing briefs in courts to support limiting subpoenas, the company usually complies with them.
Internet companies consider themselves more like phone companies than publishers.
By contrast, news organizations have historically fought subpoenas that seek to unmask anonymous sources. Court rulings in online anonymity cases have been mixed. Last year, a Florida judge said a businessman's right to face his accuser in court was more important than the defendant's right to remain anonymous. That's why the Ku Klux Klan wears hoods. A Florida appeals court later affirmed the ruling in favor of Erik Hvide, the former chief executive officer of Hvide Marine Inc., who contends that he was forced out of his job because of Internet postings.