## Facts

- CompuServe operated a proprietary online service and computer network that processed and stored email for its subscribers.
- Cyber Promotions and its president sent large volumes of unsolicited commercial email advertisements to many CompuServe subscribers.
- Defendants’ messages used CompuServe’s servers for processing, routing, and storage, consuming finite processing power and disk space.
- CompuServe notified defendants that they were prohibited from using CompuServe’s equipment for unsolicited email and demanded they stop.
- Defendants continued and increased their transmissions after notice.
- CompuServe implemented technical measures to block defendants’ email, but defendants intentionally evaded those measures.
- The spam generated subscriber complaints and alleged loss of customer goodwill and subscriptions, along with degradation of system performance.
- After a temporary restraining order, CompuServe sought a preliminary injunction to extend restrictions and prevent further unsolicited advertising email to CompuServe subscribers through CompuServe’s systems.

## Issues

1. Whether defendants’ continued transmission of unsolicited commercial email through CompuServe’s systems, after notice and while evading blocking measures, constituted trespass to chattels warranting preliminary injunctive relief.
2. Whether the First Amendment entitled defendants to use CompuServe’s privately owned network to distribute unsolicited advertisements.

## Decision

- The court granted CompuServe’s motion for a preliminary injunction.
- The court held CompuServe showed a likelihood of success on trespass to chattels because defendants intentionally intermeddled with CompuServe’s computer systems by transmitting substantial volumes of unsolicited email after being told to stop and by evading blocking measures.
- The court found sufficient interference and harm where spam consumed processing and storage capacity, impaired system availability for subscribers, and injured business relationships and goodwill through subscriber dissatisfaction and cancellations.
- The court rejected defendants’ First Amendment defense because CompuServe was a private entity and could exclude unwanted use of its proprietary systems; enforcing CompuServe’s property rights did not require CompuServe to carry defendants’ messages.
- The injunction barred defendants from sending unsolicited email advertisements to CompuServe subscribers via CompuServe’s systems.

## Legal Principles

- Trespass to chattels may be established by intentional use or intermeddling with another’s personal property when the interference impairs the condition, quality, or value of the chattel, deprives the possessor of use for a substantial time, or causes harm to a legally protected interest.
- Electronic transmissions can constitute actionable intermeddling with computer systems when they impose measurable burdens on finite processing and storage resources.
- Continued transmissions after explicit notice to stop, coupled with circumvention of technical blocks, supports a finding of intentional and unauthorized interference.
- A private network owner generally has the right to exclude others from using its systems; the First Amendment does not compel a private entity to provide access for unsolicited advertising.
- For preliminary injunctive relief, ongoing and difficult-to-quantify harms to system performance, customer goodwill, and business relationships can support irreparable injury, and the balance of harms may favor barring unwanted use of proprietary systems.

## Conclusion

The court enjoined a bulk email marketer from sending unsolicited advertisements through an online service’s proprietary network, holding that the intentional, unauthorized, and resource-burdening transmissions likely constituted trespass to chattels and that the First Amendment did not require a private network operator to carry unwanted messages.


CompuServe Inc. v. Cyber Promotions, Inc., 962 F. Supp. 1015 (S.D. Ohio 1997)