Judge Charles Weiner initially issued a temporary restraining order barring AOL from blocking Cyberpromo. After the issues were briefed Judge Weiner found that there were no disputes over the facts of the case, and issued a summary judgment opinion. He held that AOL is not a state actor, and is not working in conjunction with the government. As a wholly private actor, AOL is not required to open its network to Cyberpromo, and is therefore within its rights to block e-mail from the Cyberpromo's domains. Additionally, Judge Weiner stressed that there are other ways for Cyberpromo to reach the same audience, including through traditional marketing methods such as postal mail, and that this ruling does not close off all means of communication.
Users can turn off the filter if they want to receive it.
Cyberpromo may have lost its First Amendment case, but it hasn't given up yet. The company has now filed a new motion alleging that the PreferredMail filter violates federal anti-trust laws. They have not decided whether to appeal the decision. In order to protect the privacy of the users, and to enable secure online transactions, the boxes encode the information that moves between the users and the Web TV server. Building in security and privacy is great, but has unfortunately created a problem for the manufacturers.