• Four traditional media companies — Bloomberg, Dow Jones, The New York Times, and Financial Times — have filed objections against redacting customer information of the bankrupt exchange FTX’s.
• The media firms argued that releasing FTX customer information should not be redacted as there was no legal basis to do so under foreign laws.
• They further argued that customers of FTX are like any other person in the world and can be targeted by scammers regardless of bankruptcy proceedings.
Media Outlets Object to Redacted Customer Information
Four traditional media companies — Bloomberg, Dow Jones, The New York Times, and Financial Times — have filed objections against redacting information of non-U.S. customers of the bankrupt exchange FTX’s. In a May 3 court filing, the media houses argued that FTX’s effort to establish that the names of its customers constituted confidential commercial information was based on speculations that rival firms might try to lure them away.
No Legal Basis for Redaction
According to the media firms, such conjecture should not overcome the public’s presumptive right of access to bankruptcy filings. They further argued that FTX failed to demonstrate how releasing its customer information would subject them to scams, identity theft, personal attack or online victimization.
FTX Customers Like Any Other Person
The news outlets wrote that crypto owners are like everyone else scammers can target; therefore if virtually every individual party to a bankruptcy proceeding could litigate anonymously then it would make sense for FTX’s customers too.
Public Has Presumptive Right To Access Bankruptcy Filings
The media houses concluded their filing by noting that public has a presumptive right of access to bankruptcy filings and therefore urged the court not to consider sealing individuals‘ names due to potential phishing emails and fraud vectors targeting them.
Court Asked To Consider Public’s Right Of Access
To sum up their point they asked the court not to consider redaction due lack of evidence linking it with protecting non-U.S customers from harm but rather focus on public’s right of access while considering this motion filed by four renowned news outlets