Legal battle of Yahoo and IBRC over

Internet giant Yahoo has been spared a court case when the Irish Bank Resolution Corporation (IBRC) withdrew its demands that the contents of a Yahoo email concerning its relationship with the Quinn family be released to it.  No further details are given, save that the legal dispute between the two institutions are ov

The Independent  was the first to report about the end of what could have been an ongoing and costly battle between Yahoo and the IBRC.  The IBRC liquidator Kieran Walsh had sought to find information about certain assets believed to have been witheld from them by billionnaire Sean Quinn; the Quinn family had obligations to the IBRC woth 2.8 billion pounds.  Walsh believed that Quinn and/or his family had witheld naming some of these assets.  Proof of this could be found in a Yahoo email account owned by an asset-stripping specialist Abdullah Rasimov.

IBRC then asked Yahoo to release the contents of Rasimov's email to them.  Yahoo declined as its terms of agreements and other policies dictate that only the owner of the account could make that request of them.  No other party, except Rasimov, could have access to his email account. Releasing it to a third party without his consent could establish a legal precedent that could change current internet laws on privacy.  Meanwhile, the Quinns deny any wrongdoing.

IBRC gave a subpoena asking for the release of the email contents. Yahoo meanwhile made a motion to squash the sunpoena. The matter would have been decided next week.  

According to the Irish Times, Yahoo refused to hand over the email account because that would violate an actual law, the Stored Communications Act in the US. All this ended today when IBRC decided to witheld its motion, causing Yahoo to likewise withdraw its motion to squash.

Yahoo could certainly use the breather.  The Irish Independent reports that CEO Marissa Mayer is set to implement radical measures, such as workforce reduction and property sale, to stem the declining revenues of the company. Yahoo lost $4.8 billion in 2015.

Tags

Yahoo, IBRC, Sean Quinn, Abdullah Rasimov, asset-stripping, email privacy

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