To fully appreciate the gravitas of this story we need to observe the evidence....for ahem....research.....

Paris..like you need a reason ;-)

Also seems to mean having a good rummage throught and then sharing with anybody that will have a look.

Way to go MacDonalds.

So could you call this a 'You've been McJobbed'

Failing to see the IT angle here....................... Or is there a link between Sex and IT. Not in my house but maybe I missing out on something

Is it just me...

Whenever I look at 'Fayetteville', my brain applies some sort of Americojudgemental(TM) filter and processes it as 'Fattyville'.

Let's focus on the accidental leaving of the phone shall we? In a totally non loony society one would be ridiculed for a) being stupid enough to lose a camera device b) being stupid enough to leave dirty photos on said camera device. Now, in a non-loony court of law, the honus would be on the prosecution to prove that at no point did anyone other than McDonalds staff handle the phone whilst it was left unattended in the restaurant, which of course is utterly impossible and it is through this very logic I deduce that the prosecution will win.

@Mark W :

No, not just you, that happened to me as well, saw "McDonalds" and "Arkansas" and just auto completed it from context, I guess.

@Jay :

Are you really really sure, given that these are two Arkansas yanks who like Mickey Ds, that you want to see pictures of them in the buff ?

Sounds like that site got quite a few hits, I reckon the pics have been copied and distributed to the nth degree. I hope they bring McD's to their collective knees!

If the pics appeared with her name address and telephone number then it narrows it down to:

1. Someone she knows

2. McDonalds staff who were presumably told her details

Random people in the store wouldn't have those details, so they can be eliminated.

I think in a healthier society the ***** wouldn't have posted the pics on the net.

I suppose its inevitable that a percentage of McMorons employees are socially disadvantaged, but even so...

Kudos to El Reg for keeping alive the memory of the Detroit Grand Pubahs and their six nasty minutes of fame.

Would you really want nude pictures of a woman who frequents McDonalds? Unless "beached whales" floats your boat that is, pun not intended.

Paris, obvious reasons involving mobile phones, internet etc.

Like the people who plant 'roaches in McD's burgers and then try to sue, the phone was 'accidentlally left' then the pictures appeared.....? it could have been a friend who handed it in to McD's then Mr/Mrs Sherman posted the pictures herself and claimed distress perhaps?

just asking...

Or, maybe if they were sent via mms then they may have her caller id, then you look through contact book and viola, the full name and address of her. Possibly.

There is no mention as to who phoned up and who's name was given to be picking up the phone. If "phillip" gave his own name, then there must have been sopme other way to see who the naughty nude with burger love handles was...

Just because the people responsible are (presumably) McD's staff, how does that make the company liable?

The prosecution stands quite a good chance not because anyone other than the McDimwits could have handled said phone but because they were the only ones who could reasonably have known that those pictures were linked to that name and address. Obviously one can imagine someone who knew the Shermans finding it in the "restaurant" and maliciously posting the pictures, but I would think it likely that that would mean that they and not the McEejits would have given him his phone back.

Should the Shermans have had nothing to fear, one wonders...

Er, anyone who had the phone would have the details.

The photos were from the guy's wife.

Her # would be attached to the messages.

Chances are, the # and address stored on the phone (generally, your wife is in your address book... )

QED.

IT angle: what sort of bozo doesn't password-lock his phone?

@Tony Hoyle - did it occur to you her name, address, and telephone number might just possibly be on the phone along with the pics?

It's a pretty safe bet that any one who picked up the phone had access to her name and phone number at the very least. The idea that only someone who knows her or 'McDonalds staff who were presumably told her details' would be the only ones who'd know that information is, frankly, moronic.

Mc Donalds will just say that the phone was handed in by another customer and that they could easily have sent copies of the pictures off the phone.

Sounds impossible to prove otherwise to me unless they can prove when the date and time that the pictures were taken off the phone.

Yokel leaves phone with bluetooth turned on and no security. Geek comes in with phone program that can search other phones who leave their bluetooth unsecured. finds phone left in office, steals pics, and contact details for wife, which happen to include address,

Leave a phone with compromising pictures on it with someone representing someone who can be sued. Get an accomplice to put the pictures on the net, using an Internet Cafe near to where you left the phone. Move house to where you were planning to go all along. Claim whoever offered to look after your phone for a few minutes was responsible and sue them for moving costs and distress.

Or

3 Extortion attempt.

A) Load your wife's nude pics on a website.

B) "Lose" your phone at McD.

C) Try and sue the arse of McD

Mine's the one without a mobile phone in the pocket.

I accidentally a whole camera phone full of noodz, is this bad?

So how many of you dimwits need to keep your wifes address on your phone then? I tend to be able to remember my address and those of my family, so they don't need to be on there.

I agree that it is going to be very difficult to prove fault in this case without tracing who supplied the pics to a website to an employee of McD's.

But even if they win, I'm not sure how much compensation the Shermans can expect to be awarded for the public display of her Big Macs and Chicken Sandwich. They'd have to demonstrate damage directly related to this, and a quick troll of the net suggests the pictures weren't widely distributed - even torrent sites don't throw them up.

Mine's the one with the polaroids in the pocket

Their lawyer will have to be able to prove in court that they had possession of the phone the whole time and that some customer didn't in fact have it first and perhaps turn it in to them as "having been left there". Other than that, the judge should rule them and their lawyer numpties and throw the case out of court while forbidding them from ever bringing forth offspring.

Since Bradford is the officailly the fattest city in the UK, do we now christen it Brad-fat-fuck-ford?

"What's wrong with the time-honoured mouse-head-in-your-mcnuggets scam?"

it's so 20th Century, and tends to get you banged up nowadays..

http://www.freestuffhotdeals.com/freebies/showthread.php?t=5077

This /could/ be a scam attempt. Not saying it is, but it could be.

"unwashed masses". Yuk. You mean the Great Unwashed? Not at all the same thing. Ok, Lester's oversight ("horray, I just knocked out another one!"), but frankly I blame the BBC and its culture of feeding the sheople on bland woss. It gets to us all.

More to the point, who is using Auntie to send "a message" to whom?

Surely Filet-o-Fish would have been more appropriate than Chicken Sandwich?

Mine's the one with the lost-n-found pr0nphone in the pocket.

Just eating at McWorms doesn't automatically make you a fat whale.

I used to eat there every day for years. I weighed 135 pounds at 5 feet 10 inches (62 Kg and 1.78m for you metric types) during that part of my life.

These days, I don't eat at McDs at all, but I now weigh 85Kg (187 pounds.) Is that due to my wife's cooking? No, it is due to the fact that I don't get the exercise these days that I did back then.

Boffin? I guess you've go to be one to figure out that is isn't just what you eat but how much you eat and how much you burn off that determines whether you turn into a whale or not.

This sounds like a scam. Funny how this sort of thing never happens in a poor independent burger joint which does not have billions in the bank.

...McDs had the address, not because the address was on the phone, but because *the bloke rang the place to tell them he'd lost it* - as a matter of course McD's would have taken his name and address at that point.

@Lloyd - yes, you're fucking perfect, and never lose anything, and anyone who does is too stupid do deserve any protection. Right. What you actually are, sir, is an intellectual bully. "I'm cleverer than these people, so they're pathetic". No better, really, than the bullies who push less athletic people in the mud because they're physically weaker and therefore somehow "deserve" it. Of course, it's simpler than that. I've got a perfectly good, well above average IQ (so "stupid" doesn't cut it with me), but I'm forever losing things because I have poor short term memory. So do lots of people. But still, if you feel you've got a stick to beat people with, feel free.

…for the sheer amount of stupidity involved. It's not the non-food place's staff's fault that a. the phone was left lying there unguarded for who knows how long until somebody working at the place noticed it, b. that the thing was not protected against unauthorized use in any way, and most of all c. that the missus chose to practically self-publish the pictures. Classic FAIL. Basically, I'd say the couple are trying to cash in on their own ineptitude and stupidity.

According to the report on this in the Independent (*), some of the posted photos had had McD-related captions and even McD logos added to them. Which may or may not make it seem more or less likely that they were actually snaffled by a McD employee, or that it was a scam. They also suggest that the photos looked suspiciously professional.

(*) though I'm not sure I'll believe anything the Independent ever prints. Today they have a big spread on pages 5-6 with infographics explaining what the 17.5% to 15% VAT cut will mean for real prices. Except that the numbers are all wrong; they've reduced them by about twice what they should have done. And curiously, the web site now seems to be down.

Ok, so they lost some naughty pics and had them posted online. Now we are talking a lady who dines out in McDonalds here, so I am guessing not exactly prime internet perv fodder- if they had just put it down as carelessness, and pledged to be more careful in the future this would have just gone away.

But no, they sue. Now the international media has the story, and I am pretty sure the said picture/s is a mere Google image away (I am at work, so despite my own morbid curiosity probably shouldn’t check, but I am sure a fair chunk of readers already have). By now every single person they know will have heard about it.

The fact that money is obviously more important to them than their own dignity, really defeats their already tenuous case.

Um, ok so say the address was in his cell phone. I have about 1,000 contacts in my cell phone. How would you match a name/address/phone number to the naked pictures on my cell phone?

I would argue there is no way you could link address, name and phone number information from my contacts with pictures on my phone if I left it behind and unlocked. You would need additional information/knowledge from a different source.

The reason for the title "a clever way to make money" is because people are likely to take this kind of account at face value and your view seems to confirm this. Maybe you're right that I'm being a bit cynical and this did happen to them and distress them as they alleged, or maybe not. On past form McDonalds have paid a lot of money in lawyers and investigators to defend their reputation even when they were not justified in doing so (search for McLibel). I agree that if this is a scam then it is elaborate, which is why for someone to dream this one up the first time it would be clever. But once having conceived it, executing it would be devastatingly simple and not very difficult to cover the traces, don't you agree ?

It will be interesting to get further reports of this case as it pans out.

I don't think anyone here is really disputing the fact that it probably was one of the shitty little McBeavis's (should that be McBeavii? :P). I think most people's objection is to the fact that there now trying to sue McDonalds! I mean what has McDonalds got to answer for? Maybe the individual franchise manager for not making sure the phone was secured and not left for the McBeavis's to play with, but apart from that, there's not much more that could have been done. Additionally, as has been previously mentioned, showing exactly who took the photos would be pretty damn hard to prove in a court of law i would think. Seems to me like a jumped up lawsuit of the kind only America can produce...

@Anonymous: The address may have been on the phone, particularly if the contact was sent via bluetooth, for example, rather than being manually entered. It may also have been on the phone in a stored SMS. Even if it wasn't on the phone, it is not typically hard to obtain someone's address if you've got their name and phone number, and their husband's mobile phone.

Either way, the idea that knowledge of name, address, and phone number is proof of the involvement of McDonald's because only they, or someone who knows the couple, could have known those details is moronic.

And @Mad Hacker, read the article: 'US woman who sent some nude snaps of herself to her hubby's mobe' - if she sent the pics, her contact details were likely stored with the pic.

The whole case depends on the ip address and time of submission of the pictures to the website.

That will be the only way to prove the upload was done by employees an not by someone else.

They have vicarious responsibility through the "agency" principle. The company and employees involved are jointly and severally responsible for the affront to the customer.

IANAL, but that's what the Internet says on the matter.

I've seen several comments assuming the owner's full name and address or his wife' address would be saved on his phone. Why in the world would that be? Do you think the guy doesn't know without looking at his phone where he and his wife live? I have never put my own address into my own address book. I just always figured finding my way home was something I should be able to do from memory.

This is sufficiently obvious that it may well have been thought of and used already, but given the rate at which private photos of privates get leaked, I'd like to try to add this to the wonderful English language:

"You've been prned!"

/Paris KNOWS about being prned!

1) leave phone in McDonalds

2) have wife send nude piccies to your phone

3) ???????

4) Profit...

How did you work that out? I was simply pointing out (without swearing or cowardly hiding myself) that in a civilised society a case like this wouldn't stand up in court, if the same thing had happened and no one had handed in the phone then who would they sue? No one, it would simply be their fault for a) keeping the photos (and possibly details) on the phone b) losing the thing in the first place. But we are talking about the land of the free litigation here.

Ever used a smartphone? Those tend to sync with Outlook or other similar tools, which allow to store much more stuff than only an address. Not to mention that these smartphones usually have some "Owner Information" screen where the owner can type in his/her home address if the device ever gets lost. So even if he didn't put his addy in his wife's contact info (after all, they live in the same home!) anyone with the handset would see the pics as being from "Wifey" and also have the bloke's address from the aforementioned "Owner Info" section.

I always push for people to password-lock their devices, but sadly, not every handset supports this (I know my w300 didn't) so there are cases of people who can't do it even if they wanted to do it! However, there are too many stupid people who think password-locking their handsets is overkill, in which case this incident might make them reconsider.

I have a right to carry around pornography in public in private, damnit!

A lot of people seem to be saying that because the guy was careless with his phone, this somehow justifies leaking personal intimate photos of someone else, and either a) leaking their contact details, or b) making abusive phone calls... It doesn't

Let's make an analogy here... Let's say I was to, in violation of my employer's security policy, copy company data onto my laptop, which I then left in McDonalds. Let's say I get it returned, but subsequently find the data has been leaked on the internet by the manager of the store. I would, quite rightly, be fired, for having that data on my laptop in the first place. Does that mean the manager would then be told "The guy was an idiot so you're not getting the book thrown at you" ? Hell no!

The guy probably deserves an amount of ridicule for this (his wife does not) but I fail to see why that means they don't get to sue McDonalds, although the sucess will hinge around who had access to the phone. (If it can be proved that the images were copied after the manager spoke to the guy, he deserves the book thrown at him, because that either means he did it, or he let his crew play around with someone else's property)

Just because you can send nude pics of yourself by mms doesn't mean you should. just because you can lose your phone, unlocked, with said pics on it doesn't mean you should. Just because you can sue the hell out of... no, wait a minute, you shouldn't be allowed to do that last one. you can't sue people for you own stupidity, can you?

As for the address thing, if it's a "smartphone", the guy probably had his contact list on it, which may or may not include his own address (but likely does) and may or may not include his wife's address (but likely does, too). Not because he couldn't remember his own address, but because lots of people like to use e-business cards, and lots of people use e-mail signatures.

Moronic lawsuit by a greedy and/or moronic couple.

Most mobile phones provide the facility to enter your details and then the ability to use bluetooth or, in the old days, infrared to exchange your details with others conveniently. Ok, hubby sounds a bit thick but perhaps he put his and his wife's contact details in there? I have personal and business contact details in my phone for this purpose. Of course people are going to lose their phones or have them stolen. The moral of the story is not to have anything you want to lose on them;).

I don't know about you, but I have my home phone number listed in my mobile (so I can call home to see if she needs my to pick up bread or milk on the way home), and many US phone directory websites offer free reverse lookups, so finding a home address for a "found phone" can be a fairly trivial process in the US.

The guy should be suing for copyright violation, not emotional distress. After all, the photos in question are intellectual property, protected by copyright law.

Then he just needs to get some of the RIAA's intellectual property lawyers involved and he's golden.

This is just another example where an American wants to make a fast buck my sueing someone. A survey was conducted asking American's how they would get rich and the majority answered by sueing someone.

The couple concerned can't sue a member of the public that might have actually accessed the pictures and posted on to the net because they have no idea who it is, so in order to become rich, they have to sue MacD.

I dunno about US courts, but if this was in the UK, the defendant simply has to say "the access of the images took place whilst the phone was not in our possession. They left it on a table, that's their carelessness and we are not responsible for what happens to the phone before it was handed into us. The plaintiff should ensure that if they are sending such sensitive images to each other then they should take appropriate precautions to ensure the security of those images, such as putting a pin code lock on the keypad, which the phone almost certainly provides". Case dismissed. Judgement in favour of the plaintiff.

And they'd end up paying the court costs of MacD.

When was the phone missing, vs when where the pics found?

How were the pics found, which of the two regularly browse for pr0n?

So if the phone goes missing in the afternoon, and the misses finds the pics 'a day later' ... scam and fail

Paris, cause she's her own IT angle these days

Lord knows we've all done some less than brilliant things while in the heat of passion and or other intoxicants, but I'm still amazed at the number of people who take nudie pictures of themselves or others, then fail to consider that they may wind up in someone else's hands.

On a phone no less, an item that is routinely loaned to friends and co-workers, and that is a favorite "toy" to small children. I'm even cautious about what I leave on my desktop hard drive at home, and can't imagine leaving this kind of thing on my cel phone or laptop!

I agree (as per my earlier post) with your gist, though I disagree with your statement that the judgment would be in favour of the _plaintiff_; quite the contrary!

@James: As I said... nobody knows how long that phone was lying around unattended. That alone should make any case against McBarf's the company, the particular franchise involved and any of its employees and management truly null and void. But I have full confidence in the U.S. justice system yet again perverting itself.

you wife's or girlfriends full name, address and telephone number on your phone...

what if you were in a accident, your phone will be a good way to contact your family quickly if all the details are present and correct....

I can here the replies of "they should be able to trace you through the content of your wallet", Well I do not always take my wallet out with me, where i do always take my phone...

mines the one with the phone in the pocket !!

I expect that it will be entirely McDonalds' fault unless they can produce for the court's perusal their detailed policy on what to do with a lost mobile phone with nude pictures on it.

Paris, I think she would sympathise with that poor woman who has her nude pictures on the interweb... and Paris might know how to make more money out of it

And order them to go back to school for a couple of years and be given lots of free lessons specifically focussing on "common sense"

Although they don't seem to need any help in the "how to cook up a plan, choose a target and milk them dry" department.

I hope it gets thrown out.

They do need to prove who put it on the net first, IMO.

Why should the tribunal believe them and not the McPeople?

Then, suing McDonald's itself is an obvious attempt in getting the

biggest amount of $$$ possible. What was the chain supposed to do?

Tell all its employee that they should respect people's privacy?

Perform complicated psychological tests on every potential employee

to check they would not do that?

I hope they get very little cash.

62 comments and still no-one has posted a link to the pics. Come on guys, you're slipping!

For my sins, my Google-fu is weak as I can't find them either

RotaCyclic :

"A survey was conducted asking American's how they would get rich and the majority answered by sueing someone."

While I don't doubt that Americans aren't the most moral of people going, do you have a link to any evidence pointing to the existence of this alleged survey?

Although, if the majority of the respondents answered by sueing someone instead of checking the little box or what-have-you, I'm inclined to think this does indeed back up the image of a sue-happy society you attempt to conjure up.