Intel Wins E-Mail Case

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April 28, 1999 (3:23 PM EDT)

By Malcolm Maclahlan,

In a case that could have wide-reaching implications on Web freedom of speech and spamming, Intel has won a suit against a former employee who was using the company's employee e-mail directory.

The defendant, Ken Hamadi is a former Intel engineer fired in 1996, following a dispute over a disability claim. Hamadi took his gripes to the Web, founding a website called FaceIntel.com to publicize what he said was Intel's mistreatment of workers.

He also began sending e-mail to Intel employees, publicizing the site and asking them to send in complaints about the company. Using an e-mail directory that he said was sent to him anonymously by an Intel employee, he sent seven e-mail messages to 30,000 Intel employees beginning in December 1996. Hamadi stopped sending e-mail in November when Intel won a preliminary injunction against him.

Sacramento Superior Court Judge John R. Lewis ruled Tuesday that Hamadi's actions constituted trespassing onto the company's private computer system.

"The mere connection of Intel's e-mail system to the Internet does not convert it into a public forum," his decision read in part. "The court finds that Hamadi's e-mails are not protected speech."

He is now barred from using the directory or sending e-mail. So are the 300 members of Face Intel, Hamadi said, a group consisting mostly of other disgruntled former employees.

Intel originally sought monetary damages against Hamadi, but eventually dropped that part of the case. Hamadi, 51, has vowed to appeal. "If I have to I'm going to take it all the way to the Supreme Court," he said.

Hamadi and his lawyers disagreed with the claim that e-mail could be considered private property. He added that Intel never pursued him on libel or slander charges, saying this shows that Intel could not disprove any of his claims.

Finally, Hamadi said, he respected "netiquette" by letting recipients request not to receive the e-mail. About 400 of those on the original list did so, he said.

If a Supreme Court bid fails, he said, he will begin sending the e-mail again, despite the fact that he could face a criminal injunction or even jail time.

If allowed to become precedent, this ruling could essentially let companies and ISPs block out anyone they want for any reason, said Shari Steele, director of legal services for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, an online free-speech group. It even opens the possibility of criminal charges against people who send out such non-commercial e-mail. She added that the EFF plans to get involved in Hamadi's appeal.

"We're not trying to set legal precedent here," said Tracy Koon, director of corporate affairs at Intel. "We just wanted the spamming to stop."

Koon said that Intel has never questioned Hamadi's right to free speech. It has done nothing about his website, his leafleting of college campuses where Intel recruits, or his statements in the media. It merely contested his use of Intel's network, she said, and took legal action only after asking him to stop several times.

Bill McSwain, an editor for the Harvard Law Review, will publish an analysis of Hamadi's case in the Review's next issue. He said the judge missed the point of the case in his ruling. Trespassing arguments have been used to stop commercial spammer's, he said, based on two factors.

First, if spammers were sending so much mail they were overloading corporate servers. Second, if their message was commercial, and thus not subject to the same level of First Amendment protection. Neither of these factors apply to Hamadi, he sent out a limited number of postings that involved speech that could arguably be protected by the First Amendment, he said. "The judge's ruling doesn't address Hamadi's speech at all."