Web Publisher Seeks Injunctive Relief To Address Web Scraper's Domain Name Maneuvers Intended To Avoid Court Order

Late last year, Chegg Inc. ("Chegg"), an online learning platform, obtained a preliminary injunction based on allegations that the various operators of the Homeworkify website ("Defendants") – which allows users to view Chegg's paywalled solutions without creating an account – violated the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA). (Chegg Inc. v. Doe, No. 22-07326 (N.D. Cal. Nov. 7, 2023)). In addition to finding a likelihood of success on relatively novel CFAA claims (at least for a scraping dispute) that involved alleged stolen user credentials and a retaliatory denial-of-service (DDos) attack, the court granted Chegg's request to transfer the Defendants' Homeworkify domain to Chegg for a limited time to prevent what the court called Defendants' "continued harmful conduct."