The U.S. Supreme Court is requesting that startup hiQ Labs Inc. respond to LinkedIn’s request for intervention of a ruling in the Ninth Circuit. In its petition for writ of certiorari filed in March, LinkedIn claimed that hiQ has been violating federal antitrust laws by scraping data from LinkedIn’s publically available pages, and selling that data back to employers. The Ninth Circuit’s ruling held that LinkedIn cannot invoke the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, as the information on LinkedIn is able to be accessed without logging onto the site. In its request for review, LinkedIn argued that the Ninth Circuit’s ruling will affect users’ ability to control who accesses and uses their data.

The Supreme Court’s unusual decision to ask for a response has been seen as a possible signal that at least one of the Court’s judges is interested in the case between hiQ and LinkedIn. The Supreme Court has given hiQ Labs until May 26 to file its response. We will continue to monitor for updates in this case.