Opinion
No. CV 11-01055-PHX-FJM
08-28-2012
Xcentric Ventures, LLC, Plaintiff, v. Karsen, Ltd., et al., Defendants.
ORDER
The court has before it plaintiff's motion for protective order and motion to quash (doc. 41), defendant Selihov's response (doc. 45), and plaintiff's reply (doc. 49).
Defendant issued a subpoena to non-party Google, Inc. seeking seven categories of items. Plaintiff seeks a protective order preventing defendant from seeking information in three of these categories. Sections 5 and 7 request information about advertisements displayed on plaintiff's website through a service provided by Google called Google AdSense. Defendant has withdrawn this part of his subpoena. Therefore, this portion of plaintiff's motion is moot.
Section 6 of the subpoena requests the IP addresses used by plaintiff's staff to log into plaintiff's Google AdSense account. Plaintiff argues that defendant could use this information improperly. It requests a protective order barring defendant from obtaining, from Google or any other source, any information about IP addresses used by plaintiff and its staff members. In his response, defendant proposes two alternatives to alleviate plaintiff's concerns. First, he suggests that he could produce his list of IP addresses before obtaining the IP addresses used by plaintiff. Second, he offers to have his lawyer check the lists of IP addresses against each other without showing plaintiff's IP addresses to defendant. Plaintiff does not address either suggestion in its reply.
Pursuant to Rule 26(b)(1), Fed. R. Civ. P., "[p]arties may obtain discovery regarding any nonprivileged matter that is relevant to any party's claim or defense." The IP addresses used by plaintiff's employees to log into plaintiff's Google AdSense account are relevant to defendant's defense that these employees posted the allegedly infringing materials on his website.
Despite a matter's relevance, the court may limit discovery. "The court may, for good cause, issue an order to protect a party or person from annoyance, embarrassment, oppression, or undue burden or expense[.]" Rule 26(c), Fed. R. Civ. P. "A party asserting good cause bears the burden . . . of showing that specific prejudice or harm will result if no protective order is granted." Foltz v. State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co., 331 F.3d 1122, 1130 (9th Cir. 2003). Plaintiff does not allege that a protective order is necessary to protect it from annoyance, embarrassment, oppression, or undue burden or expense. It speculates on how defendant might misuse the requested information, but provides no particular facts showing that harm will result if a protective order is not granted. Plaintiff also does not respond to defendant's suggested alternatives, even though they would apparently prevent the speculated misuse.
IT IS ORDERED DENYING plaintiff's motion for protective order and motion to quash (doc. 41).
__________________
Frederick J. Martone
United States District Judge