Consumer Protection

  • July 07, 2025

    SEC Says Adviser Posed As Clients To Approve Fee Hikes

    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has sued a Chicago-based investment adviser and its owner for allegedly charging clients more than $2.5 million in unauthorized fees without clients' knowledge, accusing them of posing as clients to approve the fees online in some instances.

  • July 07, 2025

    Etsy Shares User Data With Google And Meta For Ads, Suit Says

    Etsy flouts privacy laws by illegally sharing website visitors' information with third parties through the surreptitious use and deployment of tracking pixels created by Google, Meta, TikTok and Microsoft for behavior profiling and real-time digital ad bidding auctions, according to a proposed class action filed last week in California federal court. 

  • July 07, 2025

    As New Era Dawns For College Athletes, Repairs Still Needed

    As far back as late 2023, when a broad cross-section of former college athletes was certified as a class to sue the NCAA for unpaid name, image and likeness compensation, all parties involved have known that the eventual settlement of its claims would repair just one specific broken part of the college sports ecosystem. With the portion of the $2.78 billion settlement designed to share institutional revenues directly with athletes going into effect on Tuesday, legal experts still wonder how and when enough will be done to set right the scales that went unbalanced for decades.

  • July 07, 2025

    Mich. Starbucks Customer Drops Hot-Drink Burn Suit

    Starbucks Corp. and a customer who suffered severe burns when hot tea spilled on her lap at a Michigan drive-through have confidentially settled her negligence lawsuit, culminating in a dismissal with prejudice in federal court.

  • July 07, 2025

    Deere & Co. Needn't Give More Financial Docs In Repair Suit

    An Illinois federal judge overseeing twin cases alleging Deere & Co. is violating the Sherman Antitrust Act through its control of repair tools decided Monday not to force the company to produce its dealer financial analysis documents, saying any relevant information in them has already been produced elsewhere in the cases.

  • July 07, 2025

    ​​​​​​​Top Groups Lobbying The FCC

    The Federal Communications Commission heard from advocates more than 100 times in June on issues including Alaska high-speed connectivity, cable rates, FCC rules covering pole attachments for broadband equipment, rural network deployment and more.

  • July 07, 2025

    Calif. Fails To Pause 23andMe's Sale During Appeal

    A Missouri bankruptcy judge on Monday refused California's request that genetic testing company 23andMe Holding Co.'s $305 million Chapter 11 sale be tabled while the Golden State seeks an appeal.

  • July 07, 2025

    Crypto Group, Treasury Drop 11th Circ. Tornado Cash Case

    Crypto think tank Coin Center Inc. and the U.S. government have ended their battle over the Biden-era blacklisting of Tornado Cash now that the U.S. Treasury Department has removed the crypto mixing service from its list of blocked entities and a federal judge has deemed the designation unlawful.

  • July 07, 2025

    Wis. Rep. Pushes 2 Bills To Counter EU's Tech, ESG Rules

    A Republican U.S. House representative recently introduced two pieces of legislation over European Union regulations the congressman has deemed to be burdensome to U.S. companies, according to a recent announcement from the representative.

  • July 07, 2025

    Uber Is Sued After Driver Allegedly Raped Fla. Bartender

    A bartender at a Miami-area restaurant has sued Uber after she allegedly was raped by a driver in November 2023, saying the ride-hailing company failed to use real-time facial recognition to verify the identity of a male driver who was using his wife's account to complete rides.

  • July 07, 2025

    Samsung Settles Epic's Claims It Colluded With Google

    Epic Games Inc. on Monday voluntarily dropped Samsung from the Fortnite game-maker's latest California federal antitrust suit in light of the parties' settlement, resolving allegations the phone maker colluded with Google to circumvent an order forcing Google to open Android phones to Play Store competition.

  • July 07, 2025

    Mass. Cannabis Lab Calls Shutdown Order 'Unlawful'

    A cannabis testing lab asked a Massachusetts judge on Monday to let it resume operating, nearly a week after state regulators ordered it shut down for allegedly misreporting the results of mold and yeast tests.

  • July 07, 2025

    Biggest Enviro Cases To Watch In 2025: Midyear Report

    Law360 previews the lawsuits environmental attorneys will be watching closely during the second half of 2025, including the Trump administration's challenge to states' efforts to slow climate change, a lawsuit seeking to continue federal funding for climate change projects and product liability cases over forever chemicals in consumer goods.

  • July 07, 2025

    P&G Beats False Ad Suit Over 'Pure Cotton' Tampax, For Good

    The Procter & Gamble Co. permanently beat a proposed class action alleging that it omits the presence of organic fluorine in its Tampax products, after a California federal judge again rejected the plaintiff's testing method for detecting forever chemicals, ruling Monday that the latest iteration of the suit continued to rest on flawed testing.

  • July 07, 2025

    Ex-FTC Antitrust Chief Returns To Covington As Co-Chair

    Covington & Burling LLP has rehired the former director of the Federal Trade Commission's Bureau of Competition as a co-chair of its antitrust and competition practice group in Washington, D.C., the firm announced Monday.

  • July 07, 2025

    Some Class Certs. Granted In Amazon Alexa Privacy Suit

    A Washington federal judge on Monday granted class certification to plaintiffs with registered Amazon Alexa devices in a suit alleging the devices recorded and stored their conversations, and he denied class certification to those plaintiffs who did not have registered devices.

  • July 03, 2025

    SEC Signals Openness To Novel Crypto ETPs

    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission appears to be laying the groundwork to approve increasingly innovative crypto exchange-traded products with a staff statement on disclosure expectations and the recent approval of a novel fund, but experts said the commission's openness comes with a focus on fulsome disclosure.

  • July 03, 2025

    J.Jill Can't Compel Arbitration In False Price Discount Suit

    A California federal judge has refused to ship to arbitration a proposed class action accusing J.Jill of advertising false reference prices on products sold throughout its website, finding that the clothing retailer had failed to put the plaintiff on adequate notice that she would be bound to arbitration simply by placing an order as a guest.

  • July 03, 2025

    Calif. Justices Say Ford Can't Arbitrate Fiesta And Focus Suits

    Ford Motor Co. cannot force drivers who allege defects in their Focus and Fiesta vehicles to take their claims to arbitration, the California Supreme Court ruled Thursday, rejecting the automaker's argument that the dispute flows from dealership sales contracts containing arbitration provisions that it can invoke.

  • July 03, 2025

    FDIC's Consumer Compliance Enforcement Surged In 2024

    The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. hit banks with a surge of consumer protection-related enforcement actions in the final year of the Biden administration, issuing the largest total dollar amount of fines in almost a decade, according to a new report from the agency.

  • July 03, 2025

    7th Circ. Cuts Chicken Price-Fixing Atty Fees Again

    A Seventh Circuit panel reduced a $51.6 million fee award for class counsel who took on alleged price-fixing among the country's biggest producers of broiler chickens to about $47 million Wednesday, saying the district court made one easily-correctable error.

  • July 03, 2025

    Experian Can Arbitrate Customer's FCRA Suit, 11th Circ. Says

    Experian can arbitrate a customer's lawsuit alleging it failed to reasonably ensure the accuracy of her credit files after a fraudulent $26,922 car loan was reported, the Eleventh Circuit ruled Thursday, finding Experian provided competent, unrebutted evidence of her agreement to arbitrate after enrolling in credit-monitoring services with its affiliate. 

  • July 03, 2025

    CEO Seeks Exit From Crypto Investors' Fraud Suit

    The alleged co-CEO of purported crypto projects accused of duping investors out of tens of millions of dollars with false promises of returns has filed a motion to escape the suit, arguing he was not involved with the formation of the projects.

  • July 03, 2025

    Dems Query Banks On Any Zelle Fraud Link To Social Media

    Top Democratic lawmakers are questioning major banks on how they're protecting customers from "significant scams and fraud" via Zelle, in light of JPMorgan Chase's recent decision to block transactions that originate from social media on the peer-to-peer payment platform.

  • July 03, 2025

    CFPB Funding Cut Could Alter Injunction Calculus At DC Circ.

    The steep funding cut that Republicans have passed for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau could strengthen the Trump administration's position in its court fight to resume downsizing the agency, even if it doesn't directly resolve the legal questions at play.

Expert Analysis

  • Opinion

    Address Nationwide Injunction Issues With Random Venues

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    Many of the qualms about individual district court judges' authority to issue nationwide injunctions could be solved with a simple legislative solution: handling multiple complaints about the same agency action filed in different district courts by assigning a venue via random selection, says Harvey Reiter at Stinson.

  • CFPB Industry Impact Uncertain Amid Priority Shift, Staff Cuts

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    A recent enforcement memo outlines how the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's regulatory agenda diverges from that of the previous administration, but, given the bureau's planned reduction in force, it is uncertain whether the agency will be able to enforce these new priorities, say attorneys at Troutman Pepper.

  • Lessons From FTC Action On Dark Patterns In User Interfaces

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    The Federal Trade Commission's recent complaint against Uber for its billing and cancellation practices comes amid other actions addressing consumer confusion and deception, so it is paramount to deploy tools that assess customers' cognitive states of mind to separate lawful marketing from misconduct, says Ceren Canal Aruoba at Berkeley Research Group.

  • Series

    Adapting To Private Practice: From US Attorney To BigLaw

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    When I transitioned to private practice after government service — most recently as the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia — I learned there are more similarities between the two jobs than many realize, with both disciplines requiring resourcefulness, zealous advocacy and foresight, says Zach Terwilliger at V&E.

  • 11th Circ. Ruling Warns Parties To Follow Arbitral Rules

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    The Eleventh Circuit's recent decision in Merritt Island Woodwerx v. Space Coast is important for companies utilizing arbitration clauses because it clearly demonstrates the court's intent to hold noncompliant parties responsible in federal court — regardless of subsequent efforts to cure, says Ed Mullins at Reed Smith.

  • How The DOJ Is Redesigning Its Approach To Digital Assets

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    Two key digital asset enforcement policy pronouncements narrow the Justice Department's focus on threats like fraud, terrorism, trafficking and sanctions evasion and dial back so-called regulation by prosecution, but institutions prioritizing compliance must remember that the underlying statutory framework hasn't changed, say attorneys at Blank Rome.

  • 2nd Circ. Limits VPPA Liability, But Caveats Remain

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    The Second Circuit's narrowed scope of the Video Privacy Protection Act in Solomon v. Flipps Media, in which the court adopted the ordinary person standard, will help shield businesses from VPPA liability, but the decision hardly provides a free pass to streamers and digital media companies utilizing website pixels, say attorneys at Frankfurt Kurnit.

  • Measuring The Impact Of Attorney Gender On Trial Outcomes

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    Preliminary findings from our recent study on how attorney gender might affect case outcomes support the conclusion that there is little in the way of a clear, universal bias against attorneys of a given gender, say Jill Leibold, Olivia Goodman and Alexa Hiley at IMS Legal Strategies.

  • The Ins And Outs Of Consensual Judicial References

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    As parties consider the possibility of judicial reference to resolve complex disputes, it is critical to understand how the process works, why it's gaining traction, and why carefully crafted agreements make all the difference, say attorneys at Pillsbury.

  • Opinion

    The BigLaw Settlements Are About Risk, Not Profit

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    The nine Am Law 100 firms that settled with the Trump administration likely did so because of the personal risk faced by equity partners in today's billion‑dollar national practices, enabled by an ethics rule primed for modernization, says Adam Forest at Scale.

  • Current Antitrust Zeitgeist May Transcend Political Parties

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    The Trump administration's "America First" antitrust policy initially suggests a different approach than the Biden administration's, but closer examination reveals key parallels, including a broad focus on anticompetitive harm beyond consumer welfare and aggressive enforcement of existing laws, say attorneys at Arnold & Porter.

  • Neb.'s Cannabis Regulatory Void Poses Operational Risks

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    With the Nebraska Legislature recently declining to advance any cannabis legislation, leaving the state without a regulatory framework for voter-passed initiatives, the risks of operating without clear rules will likely affect patients, providers and caregivers, says John Cartier at Omnus Law.

  • Fla. Bill May Curb Suits Over Late-Night Collections Emails

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    A recently passed Florida bill exempting email communications from the Florida Consumer Collection Practices Act's quiet hours ban may significantly reduce frivolous lawsuits aimed at creditors and debt collectors who use email communications to collect outstanding balances from consumers, say attorneys at Holland & Knight.

  • 4 States' Enforcement Actions Illustrate Data Privacy Priorities

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    Attorneys at Wilson Elser examine recent enforcement actions based on new consumer data privacy laws by regulators in California, Connecticut, Oregon and Texas, centered around key themes, including crackdowns on dark patterns, misuse of sensitive data and failure to honor consumer rights.

  • Google Ad Tech Ruling Creates Antitrust Uncertainty

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    A Virginia federal court’s recent decision in the Justice Department’s ad tech antitrust case against Google includes two unusual aspects in that it narrowly construed U.S. Supreme Court precedent when rejecting Google's two-sided market argument, and it found the company liable for unlawful tying, say attorneys at Ballard Spahr.

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