Compliance Stuff

In a significant win for businesses fighting CIPA claims, a California federal court just held that searching sensitive health terms and distributing that information to third parties is not a legally protectable privacy interest, foreclosing a plaintiff from pursuing a class action lawsuit. Although the court allowed the plaintiff to amend his complaint and fix its deficiencies, the February 23 decision marks a significant shift in evaluating a plaintiff’s so-called injuries in these cases. Rather than accepting plaintiff’s threadbare allegations of harm, the court in  Maghoney v. Dotdash Meredith Inc.  dug into the allegations of the complaint and questioned whether the plaintiff had actually alleged awareness that his information had been shared with third parties and whether any data shared could have been associated with his name or other personally identifiable information. Here is what you need to know to use this decision to successfully defend against CIPA lawsuits, ...

A recent Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruling could have broad implications for internet privacy, and employers should take note. The state’s high court ruled in December that individuals do not have a reasonable expectation of privacy in their internet search activity for purposes of the Fourth Amendment and similar state constitutional protections. Although the case centered on a state police search in a criminal investigation, the decision will likely influence how courts applying Pennsylvania law analyze privacy expectations across a wide range of contexts, including matters concerning employment and the workplace. This Insight will discuss  Commonwealth v. Kurtz  and how this decision could impact private employers. Background on  Commonwealth v. Kurtz In an investigation into a violent crime, state police obtained a “reverse keyword search warrant” that instructed Google to identify anyone who searched the victim’s name or home address in the week before the assa...