Legal

A California jury has awarded TechForward $22 million in damages for the improper use of its trade secrets by Best Buy and two of its subsidiaries relating to TechForward's Guaranteed Buyback Program. The jury determined that Best Buy's conduct was willful and malicious. The court also awarded TechForward an additional $5 million in punitive damages. 

The U.S. securities regulator is investigating a $10 million stock sale in March by Steven Fishman, chief executive of close-out retailer Big Lots, who announced his retirement on Tuesday, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing a person familiar with the inquiry. The U.S Securities and Exchange Commission allows company executives to trade their own stock by using a preset trading plan called "10b5-1," even when they have access to private information.

Dov Charney, chief executive officer of American Apparel, the clothing retailer best known for manufacturing its clothes in the United States, stands accused of conduct that seems more typical of an overseas sweatshop boss. A lawsuit filed last week in a Los Angeles court by a former store manager accuses Charney of choking him, throwing dirt at him and deriding him with an anti-gay slur.

If your company uses cookies — small information files that are downloaded onto a computer or mobile device when a user visits a website which enable the website operator to recognize the user's device and preferences — on its website, and the website is either "designed for the European market" or "provides products or services to customers in Europe," you should be aware of the new European Union (EU) Cookie Directive.

While it doesn't have the headline-grabbing elements of a CIA sex scandal, eBay is facing major embarrassment after the Justice Department and the state of California sued the company over the content of emails allegedly sent between its former CEO Meg Whitman and board member Scott Cook, CEO of Intuit. According to the complaint, the CEOs at eBay and Intuit entered into an agreement as early as 2006 to restrict their ability to actively recruit employees from each other's company. In 2007, the pact allegedly evolved into an agreement that eBay wouldn't recruit Intuit's employees.

More than 400,000 people have signed a petition asking Macy's to sever its ties with Donald Trump, in part over his public skepticism about President Obama's birthplace. The petition on SignOn.org says Macy's should also break with Trump over his "sexist" comments about women's looks and other "unpleasant, nasty and despicable behavior." "Donald Trump does not reflect the ‘magic of Macy's.’ We urge you to sever ties with him," the petition reads. The petition was created by Angelo Carusone, who previously campaigned against Glenn Beck.

Coach, well known for its distinctive handbags, has been dealing with the issue of counterfeited items for years. On Friday, the retailer announced a significant win against the predators who trade upon its brand name. Coach said it obtained a default judgment of $257 million in Illinois Federal Court against people and businesses operating websites selling counterfeited Coach merchandise. Furthermore, the Court awarded Coach ownership of 573 domain names. These domains were allegedly used as part of the illicit sales of fake Coach items online.

The National Retail Federation (NRF) and more than a dozen of the nation's most prominent retailers yesterday asked a judge to reject a proposed class-action settlement of a federal antitrust lawsuit, saying it wouldn't bring credit card swipe fees charged by Visa and MasterCard under control and doesn't give retailers who oppose it an adequate mechanism to opt out.

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday heard oral arguments in an intellectual-property case involving an eBay seller that could define the scope of the first-sale doctrine, or the right to resell copyrighted works purchased in a legitimate transaction without first obtaining permission from the rights owner.

The currently pending Do-Not-Track federal legislation is being proposed to make it easier for consumers to block tracking cookies; however, it has not yet been passed by Congress. In the meantime, the efforts by privacy advocates are beginning to create more consumer awareness of existing web browser tools for deactivating cookies.