A federal judge on Thursday dismissed a Republican National Committee lawsuit alleging that Google’s email spam filters illegally suppressed their missives, dealing the campaign group a crushing blow in a lengthy battle that has riled conservative lawmakers in Washington.

U.S. District Court Judge Daniel Calabretta wrote that while it was a “close case,” the RNC had not “sufficiently pled that Google acted in bad faith” by filtering their messages into spam filters in its popular Gmail service. Calabretta further ruled that Section 230, the embattled law that largely shields digital services from lawsuits over third-party content they host or moderate, protected Google from the claim.

In 2022, Republicans seized on an academic study finding that Google’s filtering algorithms demonstrated a bias against conservative candidates, reigniting claims that the tech giant’s technology tips the electoral scales toward liberals by targeting voices on the right. Tech companies have long disputed the allegations.

The study also found that rival email services Outlook and Yahoo demonstrated a less pronounced political bias against liberals, and its authors told The Washington Post that GOP leaders had taken their findings out of context.

  • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Let’s say they were right and there was bias in Google’s spam filters. Isn’t that the invisible hand of the free market? They need to make up their fucking minds.

    • jeffw@lemmy.worldOP
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      1 year ago

      It truly is a benefit to society if right wing garbage gets caught in spam filters

      • meco03211@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        But was this a case of right wing garbage specifically being caught? Or was it garbage in general and that happened to be primarily right wing? I don’t want left wing garbage getting through either, but would have no hesitation believing the right produces more garbage. Thus leading to some attempt to claim political bias.

    • cantstopthesignal
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      1 year ago

      Don’t like it? Start your own email service Mr. Boot Strappington.

    • Cheers
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      1 year ago

      Maybe I’m projecting, but I’d assume the right might go off looking for websites that shout COVID is a lie and ivermectin will save you and to sign up for their email list so they can send you more about why Trump won 2020. It’s not googles fault that you gave some random dude your email to sell to the prince of Nigeria.