McKillen v. Does
- John Koeltl
- 1:26-cv-04090
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 4
Counsel of record per CourtListener. Firm names are approximate.
In Patrick McKillen v. John Does, Judge Koeltl granted IP-provider discovery, denied media-outlet discovery without prejudice, and denied broader discovery.
The ruling affects Patrick McKillen and Hume Street Management Consultants Limited, the unidentified John Doe defendants, the four internet service providers, and the thirteen media outlets identified in the opinion.
What happened
Patrick McKillen and Hume Street Management Consultants Limited sued unidentified defendants, alleging they hacked an assistant’s account, obtained confidential information, and shared it with media outlets. The plaintiffs asked to obtain early information from internet service providers and media outlets to identify the defendants.
The court found good cause for limited early discovery from the four internet service providers connected to the relevant internet address. It found no good cause for discovery from the media outlets because the providers might have the needed information and the media should generally be approached only as a last resort.
Judge Koeltl granted the motion in part and denied it in part: discovery from the internet service providers was granted, discovery from the media outlets was denied without prejudice, and the request for additional early discovery without further court permission was denied.
The detailed version
- McKillen v. Does · No. 1:26-cv-04090
- John Koeltl
- Aug. 19, 2026
Background
The plaintiffs brought claims under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act and the Stored Communications Act against unidentified John Doe defendants. They alleged that the defendants hacked into an assistant’s account, obtained confidential information, and disseminated it to various media outlets.
The plaintiffs’ investigation traced the hacking to a single internet protocol address serviced by four internet service providers. The plaintiffs also identified thirteen media outlets that published the hacked information. Before the required conference among the parties under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26(f), the plaintiffs sought subpoenas and requests under the Hague Convention to obtain information identifying the hackers from the internet service providers and media outlets.
Legal Standard
The court explained that early discovery before the defendants answer may be allowed when there is good cause. Courts commonly find good cause when a plaintiff can present an initial showing supporting its claims and cannot identify the defendants without a court-ordered subpoena.
Ruling
The court held that the plaintiffs’ proposed subpoenas or Hague Convention requests were well supported as to the internet service providers. It therefore granted the request for limited early discovery from those providers.
The court denied without prejudice the request for early discovery from the media outlets for lack of good cause. Although some media outlets appeared to have privacy policies allowing disclosure in response to subpoenas, the court found it unclear whether that applied to all of them. The plaintiffs sought information on the same subjects from the internet service providers and gave the court no specific reason to believe those providers no longer had the information needed to identify the defendants. The court also emphasized that the media should generally be a last resort for obtaining information because journalists may have a qualified privilege against compelled disclosure of confidential sources.
The court separately denied the request for additional early discovery without further court permission, finding that request too broad and unsupported by good cause, particularly because discovery from the internet service providers might be sufficient.
Disposition
The Motion for Early Third-Party Discovery was granted as to discovery from the internet service providers, denied without prejudice as to discovery from the media outlets, and denied as to additional early discovery without further permission of the court. The clerk was requested to close ECF No. 8.
Read the full 4-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.