On January 26, 2026, the U.S. Supreme Court granted certiorari in Salazar v. Paramount Global to clarify the scope of the Video Privacy Protection Act (“VPPA”) and resolve a circuit split on the issue. See Salazar v. Paramount Global, No. 25-459 (S. Ct.). The VPPA is a federal law that prohibits a “video tape service provider” from “knowingly disclos[ing], to any person, personally identifiable information concerning any consumer of such provider.” 18 U.S.C. § 2710(b)(1). A “consumer” is a “subscriber of goods or services from a video tape service provider.” Id. § 2710(a)(1). A “video tape service provider” includes “any person, engaged in the business, in or affecting interstate or foreign commerce, of rental, sale, or delivery of prerecorded video cassette tapes or similar audio visual materials.” Id. § 2710(a)(4).
In Salazar, the petitioner subscribed to Paramount’s newsletter (rather than a video service) and allegedly viewed videos on 247Sports.com (an online platform the petitioner alleged Paramount owned and operated) that did not relate to the newsletter. The petitioner claimed that Paramount violated the VPPA by sharing his video viewing activity with Facebook through Facebook’s Meta Pixel, a website tracking technology often used for marketing, without valid consent.
The primary issue is the threshold question of whether the petitioner is a “consumer” under the VPPA. The Court will focus on whether the district court and the Sixth Circuit properly found the VPPA’s “consumer” definition encompasses only audiovisual goods or services from a provider—and not all “goods or services from a video tape service provider.”
There is a circuit split on this issue: The Second and Seventh Circuit have ruled the “consumer” definition concerns all “goods or services from a video tape service provider.” See Salazar v. Nat’l Basketball Ass’n, 118 F.4th 533 (2d Cir. 2024); Gardner v. Me-TV Nat’l Ltd. P’ship, 132 F.4th 1022 (7th Cir. 2025). Meanwhile, the D.C. Circuit followed the Sixth Circuit’s narrower interpretation. See Pileggi v. Washington Newspaper Publ’g Co., 146 F.4th 1219 (D.C. Cir. 2025).
VPPA litigation has been common over the past several years, and the Court’s ruling in Salazar will likely inform how these lawsuits proceed. The Court will also have the opportunity to address—either directly or in dicta—other interpretive VPPA issues over which circuits have diverged. The Court will likely schedule oral argument in the upcoming 2026-2027 term.
[View source.]
