# IDC Financial Publishing Inc v. BondDesk Group LLC

> District Court, E.D. Wisconsin · March 10, 2020

URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/10714193

## Case

- **Court:** District Court, E.D. Wisconsin
- **Decided:** March 10, 2020
- **Opinion:** 100trialcourt
- **Cited by:** 0 later opinions in the Frix Law Library

## Citator (automated)

- No negative treatment found by the automated citator. That is not the same as a confirmation that the case is good law; read the citing cases.
- Full citator and citing cases: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/10714193

## Opinion text

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
EASTERN DISTRICT OF WISCONSIN

IDC FINANCIAL PUBLISHING, INC.,

Plaintiff,

v. Case No. 15-cv-1085-pp

BONDDESK GROUP, LLC, et al.,

Defendants.

ORDER DENYING WITHOUT PREJUDICE THE PLAINTIFF’S MOTION TO
RESTRICT (DKT. NO. 160), DEFENDANT BONDDESK’S MOTION TO
RESTRICT (DKT. NO. 169) AND DEFENDANT FIDELITY’S MOTION TO
RESTRICT (DKT. NO. 181) AND REQURING THE PARTIES TO FILE
AMENDED MOTIONS BY A DATE CERTAIN
______________________________________________________________________________

The parties have filed three motions to restrict documents.
The plaintiff’s motion asks the court to restrict Exhibits A, E, F, H and J
attached to the declaration of Matthew M. Wuest (dkt. no. 168) in support of
the plaintiff’s motions in limine. Dkt. No. 160. In support of the motion, the
plaintiff asserts that under Fed. R. Civ. P. 5.2(d) and Civil Local Rule 79(d)(4),
the court has the authority to allow parties to restrict documents “for good
cause.” Id. at 2. It asserts that courts allow parties to restrict documents that
contain sensitive business information, “especially, where, as here, the
confidential material consists of ‘trade secrets or other categories of bona fide
long-term confidentiality.’” Id. (citing Baxter Int’l, Inc. v. Abbott Labs., 297 F.3d
544, 546 (7th Cir. 2002). The plaintiff asserts that the court should restrict the
exhibits because “they reference, describe, and quote from documents and
information that the parties have designated as ‘CONFIDENTIAL’ or
‘ATTORNEYS EYES ONLY,’ and which the designating party has asserted
contains non-public and confidential business and/or financial information.”
Id. Specifically, the plaintiff says the attachments contain “confidential
deposition testimony and confidential client names and information.” Id. at 2-3.
The plaintiff says that “‘CONFIDENTIAL’ or ‘ATTORNEYS EYES ONLY’
information can also be damaging to the parties’ ability to compete in the
marketplace if public disclosures were permitted.” Id. at 3.
BondDesk’s motion is similar. Dkt. No. 169. It asks the court to restrict
three memoranda of law in support of motions in limine, asserting that there is
information in them that the plaintiff has designated confidential. Id. at 2. The
defendant asserts that the redactions in the motions “reference or describe
information that Fidelity or IDC have designated as ‘Confidential’ under the
Protective Order because they contain non-public, proprietary, and/or
competitive information belonging to IDC and Fidelity.” Id. at 3. It concludes
that IDC and/or Fidelity “may be harmed commercially if the details contained
in the proposed redactions to the Motions were made available to the public.”
Id. at 3-4. Fidelity’s motion is much the same (although it cites decisions in
which courts have declined to grant the sorts of motions the parties have filed
here). Dkt. No. 181.
None of the motions state good cause to restrict the attachments. “The
Seventh Circuit has emphasized that ‘the public at large pays for the courts
and therefore has an interest in what goes on at all stages of a judicial
proceeding.’ Citizens First Nat’l Bank v. Cincinnati Ins. Co., 178 F.3d 943, 945
(7th Cir. 1999).” Roumann Consulting Inc. v. T.V. John & Son, Inc., No. 17-C-
1407, 2019 WL 3501513, at *8 (E.D. Wis. Aug. 1, 2019). A party may override
this interest only if its privacy interest surmounts the public’s interest; “that is,
only if there is good cause for sealing a part or the whole of the record in that
case.” Id.
In Baxter—the case the plaintiff itself cited—the Seventh Circuit faced a
motion like the one the plaintiff has filed. The court explained,
[a] few weeks ago a single judge of this court, serving as motions
judge for the week, received and denied a joint motion to maintain
documents under seal. The motion was generic: it related that the
parties had agreed on secrecy, that the documents contained
commercially sensitive information, and so on, but omitted details.
What is more, the motion did not attempt to separate genuinely
secret documents from others in the same box or folder that could
be released without risk. The motion was patterned on the sort of
broad secrecy agreement that often accompanies discovery in order
to expedite that process by avoiding document-by-document
analysis. Secrecy is fine at the discovery stage, before the material
enters the judicial record. See Seattle Times Co. v. Rhinehart, 467
U.S. 20 . . . (1984). But those documents, usually a small subset of
all discovery, that influence or underpin the judicial decision are
open to public inspection unless they meet the definition of trade
secrets or other categories of bona fide long-term confidentiality.

Baxter, 297 F.3d at 545. The court went on explain that the parties had made
“no effort to justify the claim of secrecy,” simply asserting it on the ground that
the documents to be sealed were commercial documents. Id. at 546. The court
stated, “[t]hat won’t do.” Id. The court allowed the parties to amend their
motion to seal, but stated that it would “in the future deny outright any motion
. . . that does not analyze in detail, document by document, the propriety of
secrecy, providing reasons and legal citations.” Id. at 548.
Since then, the court has affirmed that it would not seal documents
“simply because the parties had agreed to do so among themselves because
that practice deprives the public of material information about the judicial
process.” United States v. Sanford-Brown, Ltd., 788 F.3d 696, 713 (7th Cir.
2015) (vacated on other grounds, United States ex rel. Nelson v. Sanford-
Brown, Ltd., 136 S. Ct. 2506 (2016)).
The plaintiff mentions “trade secrets” and confidential client names and
information. In Formax Inc. v. Alkar-Rapidpak-MP Equipement, Inc., No. 11-C-
0298, 2014 WL 792086, at *1 (E.D. Wis. Feb. 25, 2014), Judge Griesbach
discussed the issues with these sorts of unsupported assertions. He explained:
Motions to seal are becoming increasingly common and occupy an
increasing portion of the court’s time. In litigation involving
businesses expecially, it is common for one or both parties to request
entry of a protective order to govern the handing [sic] information
they may be obligated to disclose in discovery that the disclosing
party believes could damage its business if the information is
disclosed to the wider general public, including their competitors.
The typical protective order requested by the parties allows the
disclosing party to designate such information “confidential” and
thereby create a duty on the part of the receiving party to avoid any
further disclosure of the information than is necessary to conduct
the litigation. The benefit of such an order is that it increases a
party’s willingness to respond to discovery requests without
involving the court on closer questions because of fear that providing
information that is not directly relevant may cause injury to their
businesses. The difficulty arises when one of the parties decides to
include information from a document designated “confidential” as
part of a court filing. The standard protective order states that if
information from a document designated “confidential” by another
party is filed with the court, it must be sealed. Filing documents
under seal, however, conflicts with the general rule that litigation in
the courts of the United States is open to the public. Union Oil Co. of
California v. Leavell, 220 F.3d 562, 567 (7th Cir. 2000).

Id.
Judge Griesbach went on to explain that it is “not enough to simply
assert that disclosure would place a party at a competitive advantage.” Id. at 2.
While acknowledging that documents “containing highly sensitive pricing
information, sales figures, sales dollar amounts, profit and loss data, and other
financial records not normally made known to the public may be properly filed
under seal,” he explained that “not all pricing information or customer lists are
entitled to protection.” Id. at 3. He found that “[a]bsent further explanation, the
fact that documents contain such information does not constitute good cause
for sealing them.” Id.
The court will deny all three motions, because they do not state good
cause for restricting. The court will allow the parties to file amended motions
within twenty-one days—motions which comply with the Seventh Circuit’s
directive that they analyze in detail, document by document, the propriety of
the requested secrecy and provide reasons.
The court DENIES WITHOUT PREJUDICE the plaintiffs motion to
restrict. Dkt. No. 160.
The court DENIES WITHOUT PREJUDICE defendant BondDesk’s
motion to restrict. Dkt. No. 169.
The court DENIES WITHOUT PREJUDICE defendant Fidelity’s motion to
restrict. Dkt. No. 181.
The court ORDERS that if the parties want the court to restrict any
documents, they must, by the end of the day on March 31, 2020, file amended
motions to restrict that comply with this order.
Dated in Milwaukee, Wisconsin this 10th day of March, 2020.
BY THE COURT:

Chief United States District Judge

---

Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/10714193. Public record. Not legal advice.