Stanley Sues Yahoo! Over Internet Posting

By BILL LEUKHARDT

July 31, 2000 Web posted at: 1:47 PM EDT (1747 GMT)

NEW BRITAIN, Connecticut (The Hartford Courant) -- A world-famous maker of saws, hammers and other implements is using a different tool - a lawsuit - to unmask someone who anonymously posted sensitive company information on the Internet last week.

The mystery person, known only by the screen name GOLFER2072, posted a note on an Internet provider's message board July 18 that the company's second-quarter profits would be 58 cents a share.

The note was posted on a Yahoo! site used by people to discuss The Stanley Works. The same site was the focus of a lawsuit Stanley filed last September to find the identities of 13 people who had posted anonymous messages that embarrassed Stanley.

Yahoo! eventually disclosed the names. It's not clear what action, if any, Stanley took after receiving that information last fall.

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Now the company is back in court, eager to find out who released the confidential earnings-per-share information several hours before the New Britain-based firm was to make it public.

It's not clear if the early release of the figure had any effect on the company or its stock. What is clear is that Stanley is determined to find GOLFER2072 and discipline that person if he or she works for Stanley.

"This was protected information that was posted. Stanley has very clear rules and policies of confidentiality that govern all employees," said James Veltrop, a Hartford attorney handling the case for Stanley.

Veltrop declined to say what action Stanley might take if GOLFER2072 is a Stanley employee. But it can't know that unless it gets help from Yahoo!

A spokesman for the Santa Cruz, Calif., company declined Friday to discuss the specific lawsuit, but did say that as a matter of policy, Yahoo! will provide information if served a subpoena.

The issue of Internet providers giving out identities of its users has sparked at least one unmasked poster - Acquacol, a man from Ohio - to file a lawsuit in a California court against Yahoo!

That lawsuit is pending.

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