Website owners often struggle to design privacy policies that are not only comprehensive, but also comprehensible. The tension between these competing concerns was in sharp focus in a recent Ninth Circuit decision, Calhoun v....more
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has been actively flexing its authority as a privacy regulator in recent months. The agency has been especially focused on identifying data practices it views to be “unfair”, thereby...more
I was not alone in noting the significance of the D.C. district court's decision earlier this month to hold Google liable for monopolization of the general search market and the search text advertising market in United...more
Google no longer plans to remove third-party cookies from its web browser, according to a July 22 announcement. Instead, the tech giant will explore other options that allow users to make informed choices that apply across...more
Following a nine-week bench trial starting in September 2023 and closing arguments in May 2024, District of Columbia district court judge Amit Mehta ruled on August 5, 2024, that Google illegally maintained its monopoly in...more
Recently, the FTC finalized an order banning a software provider from engaging in the sale, disclosure, or licensing of web browsing data for advertising. The order resolves the FTC’s accusations that the company monetized...more
According to Chair Lina Khan, the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) recent action against Avast Limited and its subsidiaries for $16.5 million is the “highest monetary remedy in a de novo privacy violation case” and the first...more
Here are curated AG and federal regulatory news stories highlighting key areas in which state and federal regulators’ decisions are having an impact across the US: •New Jersey AG Says Bumble Bumbled Background Check...more
Advertising and privacy. In 2024, it’s hard to talk about one without the other. Almost like peanut butter and jelly. A recent case from the Federal Trade Commission is an important reminder about the privacy and...more
Avast Limited, a United Kingdom-based company that marketed its browser extensions and antivirus software to protect consumer privacy did just the opposite—storing consumer browsing data indefinitely and selling it...more
Regulators and plaintiffs’ attorneys are increasingly focused on privacy harms related to the collection and use of personal data. Could privacy enhancing technology (PETs) be a solution to these concerns?...more
Last week, the California Privacy Protection Agency (CPPA) voted in favor of a legislative proposal that would require web browsers to include a feature that allows web users the ability to exercise their privacy rights under...more
Texas has joined Arkansas and Utah as the third state to impose requirements on social media accounts for those under 18. Namely, with the Securing Children Online through Parental Empowerment Act (“SCOPE Act”), Texas will...more
As a former Special Agent for the Federal Bureau of Investigation who investigated cybercrimes involving children, I know from experience that the topic of increasing online protections for minors provoked intense debates...more
Welcome to the third edition of our AI Legal News Summer Roundup! After five class actions were filed between June 28 and July 11 (as reported on in our first edition of this series), on July 21, another class action lawsuit...more
On February 1, 2023, the European Commission (EC) published Guidance on the requirement to publish user numbers under the Digital Services Act (DSA).The Guidance contains important information for providers of online...more
The case of Popa v. Harriet Carter Gifts, Inc. “began with a quest for pet stairs.” Plaintiff Ashley Popa searched Harriet Carter Gifts’ website, added pet stairs to her cart, but never completed the purchase. During her...more
Following -by a day- a privacy-related claim challenge brought against another advertiser, the National Advertising Division found that advertiser DuckDuckGo had sufficiently substantiated its privacy claims. These cases are...more
The National Advertising Division, a self-regulatory body that examines the truth and accuracy of advertising claims, recently examined privacy claims made by Brave, Inc. Using the same analysis given to other advertising...more
On July 18, 2022, the European Council formally adopted the “Regulation on contestable and fair markets in the digital sector”, also referred to as the “Digital Markets Act” or “DMA”. This marks the final step for this new...more
TINA Investigation Sours on HelloFresh - America’s #1 food-box provider is deploying dark patterns, says watchdog - See-Through? When it comes to ingredients and suppliers, HelloFresh is all about disclosure....more
Welcome to the third installment in our eight-part series preparing you for the post-cookie world. In our first post, we provided a deep dive into third-party cookies for a baseline understanding of the technology and the...more
2021 was a rough year for many businesses, but there was at least one winner: in a recent blog post, privacy-focused search engine DuckDuckGo reported a record growth of over 46 percent and now claims to serve more than 27...more
Google Chrome, touted as the world’s most popular browser (you’ve made it when your brand becomes a commonly-used noun), has issued patches for zero-day vulnerabilities that it or external researchers have identified as being...more
The Federal Circuit handed a substantial victory to Bitmanagement Software GMBH last week, finding the U.S. Navy had infringed the company’s copyright by installing its three-dimensional visualization software on hundreds of...more