Opinion ID: 172353
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Interactive Computer Service

Text: With respect to the first requirement for CDA immunity, the district court ruled that Accusearch provided an interactive computer service. See Accusearch, 2007 WL 4356786, at . The FTC argues on appeal that Accusearch did not provide such a service because its website did not allow for any interaction between third parties. Aplee. Br. at 20. The FTC asserts that the CDA's legislative history and Congress's use of the word interactive evince an intent to protect only the providers of online bulletin boards. It distinguishes such boards from a website like Accusearch's, which merely permits a user to conduct the same sort of business that it would in a retail store (or private investigator's office). (We note, however, that the FTC's argument would also deny immunity to nonretail websites, such as one that posted medical-journal articles online (perhaps after removing graphic pictures), unless the website also permitted direct interaction among its visitors.) Accusearch essentially concedes the factual premise of the FTC's argument  namely, the absence of direct interaction among users of the Abika.com website. Although Accusearch occasionally tries to portray its website as an interactive forum on which independent researchers connected with persons seeking information, it ultimately acknowledges that all information passed between the [customer] and researcher went through Abika.com, as an intermediary. Aplts. Reply Br. at 3. But despite the FTC's accurate characterization of Abika.com, its interactivity argument does not fully respect the CDA's text. Section 230(f)(2) does not say that an interactive computer service must facilitate interaction among third parties; rather, it says that an interactive computer service is one that provides or enables computer access by multiple users to a computer server.  47 U.S.C. § 230(f)(2) (emphasis added). See Universal Commc'ns Sys., Inc. v. Lycos, Inc., 478 F.3d 413, 419 (1st Cir.2007) (web site operators ... are providers of interactive computer services because [a] web site ... enables computer access by multiple users to a computer server, namely, the server that hosts the web site. (internal quotation marks omitted)); Batzel v. Smith, 333 F.3d 1018, 1030 (9th Cir.2003) (suggesting, but not deciding, that a website necessarily provides an interactive computer service). Accordingly, we are reluctant to embrace the FTC's contention that one who operates a website does not thereby provide an interactive computer service unless it allows interaction among the users. Because we can resolve the matter of CDA immunity in this case without deciding whether the FTC's contention is correct, we leave it to another day.