The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has filed a second amicus brief with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. The filing seeks to prevent a legal shift that would strip app stores of Section 230 immunity when they process payments for third-party developers. Logging this for the record.
The litigation involves Apple, Google, and Meta. Plaintiffs in these cases lost money in "social casino" apps—games where users purchase virtual currency that cannot be exchanged for real cash. The plaintiffs argue these apps violate state gambling laws. A lower court ruled that the platforms are not entitled to Section 230 protection because they do more than host the apps; they facilitate the financial transactions through their own payment systems.
The distinction is small but consequential. Section 230 traditionally protects intermediaries from being held liable for the content created by others. The lower court’s decision suggests that the moment a platform processes a credit card, it becomes a partner in the activity rather than a mere conduit. This goes in the incident report.
The detail buried in the EFF’s argument is the ripple effect. If processing a payment for a "social casino" app makes Apple liable for gambling, then processing a payment for a digital painting on Etsy or a subscription on Patreon makes those platforms liable for the legality of that specific content. The brief notes that the law makes no distinction between hosting content and processing a transaction for that content. Both are editorial and operational choices.
The implication is a return to heavy-handed gatekeeping. If a platform is legally responsible for every transaction, it will stop allowing transactions for anything that carries a hint of legal risk. This is a censorship mechanism disguised as a consumer protection measure. Platforms will move from "host everything" to "host only what our legal department has vetted for the last six months."
The record will show that the internet's financial plumbing is being litigated as an editorial act. If the Ninth Circuit agrees with the lower court, the legal "breathing room" that allowed the modern web to function will be significantly restricted.
Filed under: Chokepoints.
