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Joanna Rosen Forster

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Joanna Forster’s multifaceted background positions her to effectively manage conflicts across the legal spectrum and across the globe. In her prior roles as general counsel (representing both plaintiffs and defendants) and as government prosecutor/enforcer, Joanna handled nearly every type of matter, ranging from complex commercial and white collar matters in areas such as employment, intellectual property, securities and antitrust law, to internal investigations and corporate and M&A transactions. She views her role as both a conflict manager, dispensing advice to avoid adversarial action, and as a tech and business litigator, resolving disputes with her client’s business goals in mind.

Having served as the general counsel and compliance officer of a publicly traded ecommerce platform operating in over 60 countries, Joanna has an appreciation of strategic dispute resolution, investigations, and compliance from a general counsel’s perspective. By understanding how business leaders combine the input of in-house and outside counsel to make decisions, Joanna is able to provide her clients with decisive and efficient legal guidance.

Her practice includes litigating domestic and cross-border complex commercial disputes and advising technology and ecommerce companies on matters related to internet platforms, product launches, market campaigns, and new vertical lines of business, all while advising on foreign and domestic laws that regulate online content, physical products, and the companies that bring them to market. Drawing on her experience as the General Counsel of an online e-commerce marketplace, Joanna also regularly advises and counsels clients on California’s Proposition 65, from prevention and compliance to remediation. Joanna is well-versed in key regulations that impact ecommerce companies, including the EU’s Digital Services Act, the U.S. INFORM Act, and the proposed SHOP SAFE Act, as well as laws and regulations that govern online speech such as the Communications Decency Act, Section 230.

Prior to going in-house, Joanna was the deputy attorney general, Corporate Fraud Section of the California Department of Justice. In this capacity, she led large, complex civil matters alleging violations of California’s False Claims Act, Securities Law, Section 17200, Cartwright Act, and other deceptive business practices. She also maintained her own investigations and litigation docket.

Before joining the California Department of Justice, Joanna spent nearly a decade in private practice, where she focused on civil and criminal antitrust and commercial litigation. She also served as a law clerk for the Honorable Consuelo B. Marshall in the U.S. District Court for the Central District Court of California.

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Each week, Crowell & Moring’s State Attorneys General team highlights significant actions that State AGs have taken. See our State Attorneys General page for more insights. Below are the updates from May 29-June 11, 2025

Multistate

  • A bipartisan coalition of 42 attorneys general sent a letter to the House Committee on Financial Services and the Senate Banking Committee regarding the Homebuyers Privacy Protection Act of 2025 (H.R. 2808 and S. 1467). The letter urges Congress to pass this legislation to end the abusive use of mortgage credit triggers and seeks to preserve the use of mortgage credit to narrowly defined, consumer consented circumstances.
  • A coalition of 8 attorneys general announced a contempt order was filed against John Spiller, owner of Rising Eagle Capital Group, JSquared Telecom, and Rising Eagle Capital Group-Cayman, which offered robocall dialer and VoIP (Voice Over Internet Protocol ) services to telemarketers. Spiller allegedly helped facilitate large volumes of robocalls, including many targeting numbers on the Do Not Call Registry, through his telemarketing service companies. Spiller is required to pay $600,000 in attorney’s fees and litigation costs for violating a 2023 court order that barred him from placing or facilitating robocalls.

Continue Reading State AG News: Robocalls, False Advertising, Inflated Rent May 29-June 11, 2025

Companies frequently face a multitude of enforcement priorities from federal and state enforcers. Join us as we discuss ways to balance competing enforcement priorities from the federal government along with potentially, 50 different states’ laws and enforcement regimes. Learn the answer to the question “What are some of the priorities companies can expect to see…

On July 1, the U.S. Supreme Court remanded a set of Florida and Texas laws restricting social medial companies’ ability to curate, amend or edit online user content in Moody v. NetChoice and NetChoice v. Paxton, but in so doing noted that “to the extent that social media platforms create expressive products, they receive the First Amendment’s protection.”[1]Continue Reading The State Law Landscape After Justices’ Social Media Ruling

California Governor Gavin Newsom announced his plans to sign Senate Bill 1037, a bill designed in response to the “statewide housing shortage crisis” that will give Attorney General Rob Bonta new civil penalty authority to hold municipalities accountable from the moment they purportedly first violate the state’s housing laws. This marks a significant change in the law.Continue Reading California to Empower Attorney General with Increased Authority to Ensure Cities Comply with State Housing Laws