Mealey's Data Privacy : Mealey's : Legal News & Analysis

Mealey's Data Privacy

September 05, 2025
Chinese Toymaker Settles FTC Claims Of Kids’ Location Data Sharing For $500,000

SAN FRANCISCO — The United States and a Chinese toy company reached a settlement of claims that the company violated minors’ privacy through its collection of their geolocation data via the firm’s robot toys, telling a California federal court that they had agreed to a penalty of $500,000 to dispose of the claims brought under the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) and the Federal Trade Commission Act.
September 05, 2025
Jury Awards Google Users More Than $425M For Online Data Gathering

SAN FRANCISCO — After an 11-day trial in a five-year-old privacy class action, a California federal jury awarded two classes of mobile device users more than $425 million for invasion of privacy and intrusion upon seclusion by Google LLC for the company’s practice of tracking mobile device users’ online activity despite selecting a setting to opt out of such data collection.
September 05, 2025
3rd Circuit: Policy Violations Not Federal Crimes, Passwords Not Trade Secrets

PHILADELPHIA — Under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA), workplace policy infractions are not federal crimes and federal and Pennsylvania laws do not hold that passwords protecting proprietary business information are trade secrets, a Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel found “for the first time” in affirming a district court ruling that two former employees of a national debt-collection firm did not commit computer fraud, steal trade secrets or violate other state and federal laws through the creation and sharing of a spreadsheet containing passwords and login information protecting “confidential and proprietary information.”
September 04, 2025
Disney Settles Children’s Online Privacy Violations With FTC For $10 Million

LOS ANGELES — In a stipulation and proposed order filed in California federal court, Disney Worldwide Services Inc. and Disney Entertainment Operations LLC (together, Disney) have agreed to pay $10 million to settle allegations by the Federal Trade Commission that it violated the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) by not properly designating whether videos it uploaded to YouTube were made for kids (MFK), which resulted in the collection of children’s personal data.
September 03, 2025
38 Amici Back Pregnancy Center In High Court Subpoena Row; DOJ Seeks To Argue

WASHINGTON, D.C. — With the Sept. 2 filing of an amicus curiae brief by six pregnancy centers, 38 briefs have been filed in the U.S. Supreme Court in support of the operator of New Jersey pregnancy centers that has resisted complying with a subpoena issued by the state’s attorney general seeking, among other things, the identities of the organization’s donors.
September 03, 2025
X Corp., Privacy Group Back Convicted Robber’s Geofence Warrant Certiorari Bid

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Social network operator X Corp. and a nonprofit privacy rights organization filed amicus curiae briefs in the U.S. Supreme Court supporting a petition for certiorari challenging the constitutionality of geofence warrants, which was filed by a man who was convicted of robbery based on geofence evidence.
September 03, 2025
Judge Won’t Compel Claim Forms, Documents In Wawa Data Breach Settlement

PHILADELPHIA — A Pennsylvania federal judge found no merit to objections raised by Wawa Inc. related to class members’ claims rate in responding to a preliminarily approved settlement agreement over a 2019 data breach, leading her to deny the convenience store chain’s motion to compel production of claim forms or communications between the settlement administrator and counsel for plaintiff financial institutions (FIs).
September 02, 2025
NBA Asks Supreme Court To Reject Invitation To Combine VPPA Petitions

WASHINGTON, D.C. — For the second time in two weeks, the National Basketball Association on Aug. 29 filed a supplemental brief asking the U.S. Supreme Court to reject an invitation to postpone the pending conference on its petition for certiorari over how to define a consumer under the Video Privacy Protection Act (VPPA), this time opposing a suggestion by the filer of a recently submitted certiorari petition in another VPPA lawsuit that the court consider both petitions in the same conference.
September 02, 2025
Online Sports Fan Suggests Supreme Court Consider VPPA Cert Petitions Together

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Six days after a Texas woman filed a petition for certiorari asking the U.S. Supreme Court to consider the standard for what constitutes “personally identifiable information” (PII) under the Video Privacy Protection Act (VPPA), she filed a letter proposing that, because of “overlap” with another case that is currently in the certiorari petition stage, the high court “may wish to consider” the two cases “during the same Conference.”
August 29, 2025
9th Circuit Affirms Dismissal Of Session-Replay Suit For Lack Of Concrete Injury

PASADENA, Calif. — Relying largely on TransUnion LLC v. Ramirez, a Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals panel upheld a trial court’s dismissal of a privacy suit over a session-replay program created by Microsoft Corp., finding that a plaintiff did not establish standing under Article III of the U.S. Constitution because she did not show that she suffered a harm that was “remotely similar” to one that has “traditionally been actionable in our nation’s legal system.”
August 28, 2025
Texas Appeals Court: Hospital Is Immune From Data Breach Suit, Subsidiary Isn’t

HOUSTON — Partly affirming the dismissal of a consolidated lawsuit brought by patients over the exposure of their personally identifiable information (PII) in a hospital’s data breach, a Texas appeals court panel found that the hospital sufficiently established that it was immune from the claims due to its status as a government entity.
August 27, 2025
Judge Issues Mixed Ruling On Federal Preemption Of New Jersey Data Shield Law

CAMDEN, N.J. — Addressing an argument that was not covered in a June memorandum, a New Jersey federal judge delivered a mixed ruling on certain defendants’ arguments that a state law protecting law enforcement and court personnel’s private information is preempted by federal laws.
August 27, 2025
Judge Dismisses Civil Rights Claims In Privacy Suit Over Educational Software

CHICAGO — An Illinois federal judge found no jurisdiction over one defendant, dismissing it from a putative class action alleging improper collection of students’ personal information via an educational software platform, and also dismissed claims brought against other defendants under federal civil rights law.
August 26, 2025
Illinois Panel Reverses Class Certification In Pepperidge Farm BIPA Case

CHICAGO — A trial court must “make explicit findings as to whether any possible conflict of interest” exists as to class counsel in an Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA) case brought against Pepperidge Farm Inc. by an employee, an Illinois appellate panel ruled Aug. 25, reversing class certification after the sole named plaintiff’s daughter’s firm was permitted to remain as class counsel.
August 26, 2025
BIPA Suit Against Coinbase Stayed Pending 7th Circuit Ruling In Parallel Suit

CHICAGO — Granting a motion by Coinbase Inc., an Illinois federal judge stayed a putative class action accusing the cryptocurrency exchange operator of violating the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA) by using photos in its user authentication process, with the judge concluding that the Seventh Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals’ upcoming ruling in another case pertaining to user authentication using biometric identifiers is likely to affect the issues in the present case.
August 25, 2025
Plaintiffs Suing Therapy App For Privacy Violations May Proceed Anonymously

SAN FRANCISCO — The anonymity of putative class plaintiffs accusing online therapy company BetterHelp Inc. of violating privacy laws by selling their personal data to third parties in violation of California’s unfair competition law (UCL) does not require dismissal, a California federal judge ruled in denying the company’s motion to dismiss, citing the nature of the plaintiffs’ privacy protection claims.
August 22, 2025
Pregnancy Center To High Court: Federal Suit Doesn’t Require State Court Ruling

WASHINGTON, D.C. — In its Aug. 21 merits brief, a nonprofit, faith-based pregnancy center asks the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn a Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals ruling that the center’s constitutional challenge of a government investigative subpoena seeking donors’ personal information is not ripe because a state court had not ruled on the matter.
August 21, 2025
Apex Doctrine At Issue In Mandamus Petition Over Zuckerberg Deposition

SAN FRANCISCO — Meta Platforms Inc. asked the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals to grant its petition for mandamus and provide guidance on application of the apex doctrine as the tech company seeks to avoid a lower court’s order that Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg be deposed in a suit over the purported collection of Facebook users’ protected health information (PHI).
August 20, 2025
YouTube, Minor Users Announce $30 Million Settlement Of Privacy Row

SAN JOSE, Calif. — Seeking to end an almost 6-year-old lawsuit over YouTube LLC’s purported collection of the personally identifiable information (PII) of minor users, a group of plaintiffs who sued YouTube and Google LLC for such alleged privacy violations moved in California federal court for preliminary approval of a $30 million settlement.
August 20, 2025
Man Says Otter Notetaker Records, Saves Conversations Without Consent

SAN JOSE, Calif. — A California man alleges that Otter.ai Inc. does not obtain prior consent of all participants in a virtual meeting before its Notetaker transcription app is engaged to record a conversation, leveling claims of computer fraud, invasion of privacy and unfair competition against the artificial intelligence (AI) technology firm in California federal court.
August 20, 2025
‘Coverage Position Is Frivolous And Unfounded,’ Insured Argues In Data Breach Suit

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — An insured sued its insurer in a federal court in Georgia for breach of contract and bad faith seeking cyber defense coverage for putative class actions brought as a result of a 2024 data breach.
August 20, 2025
College Gets Final OK To Settle Data Breach Suit For Up To $3,500 Per Person

SYRACUSE, N.Y. — Almost five months after preliminarily approving the settlement of a putative class action over a 2023 data breach experienced by an upstate New York college, a New York federal judge granted final approval to the settlement, which boasts an uncapped settlement with an estimated value of $44,720,782.68, including out-of-pocket expenses, credit monitoring and injunctive relief in the form of enhanced data privacy measures on the school’s part.
August 20, 2025
Insurer Disputes Coverage For Suit Alleging Dental Office Violated Privacy Rights

CHICAGO — A commercial general liability and umbrella insurer filed suit in a federal court in Illinois seeking a declaration that it has no duty to defend or indemnify for an underlying putative class action alleging that its dental office insured violated privacy rights through its use of internet tracking that collected private information without notice and without consent, arguing that the policy exclusion for access to/disclosure of private information bars coverage.
August 19, 2025
Genetic Data Privacy Suit Against Porta Potty Firm Survives Dismissal

CHICAGO — A job applicant’s putative class action against a sanitation company under the Illinois Genetic Information Privacy Act (GIPA) may proceed, an Illinois federal judge ruled, concluding that the plaintiff sufficiently pleaded that interview questions about his family’s medical histories constituted a request for genetic information under the statute.
August 18, 2025
NBA To Supreme Court: D.C. Circuit Ruling Confirms Split On VPPA Application

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A recent District of Columbia Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals ruling further solidified a circuit split and the “increasingly obvious need” for a grant of certiorari in a dispute over how to define a “consumer” under the Video Privacy Protection Act (VPPA), the National Basketball Association (NBA) says in a supplemental brief, again urging the U.S. Supreme Court to resolve the dispute in a lawsuit accusing the NBA of sharing the personal viewing information (PVI) of its website’s users.