Federal Judge Blocks Gov't Attempt to Get Amazon Records for Tax Billing
A federal judge in Seattle has nixed an attempt by North Carolina taxing authorities to obtain customer records from Amazon in order to impose sales tax on their purchases.
Although N.C. Revenue Department officials say they have no interest in checking to see what customers from the state are buying, reading, viewing and hearing, only in collecting tax, U.S. District Judge Marsha Pechman held yesterday that the records are protected from disclosure by the First Amendment, the Associated Press reports.
The victory is only partial, however, reports the Law & Disorder blog of Ars Technica: If Amazon redacts information about what customers purchased, the state is entitled to get customer names, addresses, purchase amounts and a general purchase category, such as books.
Similar court battles are playing out in Colorado and New York.