Specht v. Netscape, 306 F.3d 17 (2d Cir. 2002),[1] is a ruling at the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit regarding the enforceability of clickwrap licenses under contract law. The court held that merely clicking on a download button does not show consent with license terms, if those terms were not conspicuous and if it was not explicit to the consumer that clicking meant agreeing to the license.[1]
Background
Christopher Specht and several co-plaintiffs were users of the Netscape web browser and related software that they had downloaded from the Internet. The plaintiffs argued that they had not been given an opportunity to review and possibly refuse all the End User License Agreements (EULAs) that came with the software. Upon reviewing the agreements later, they found that they disagreed with a stipulation that any legal disputes must go to arbitration rather to court, and with various stipulations that allowed Netscape to track user activity in ways that allegedly invaded privacy.[1][2]