Compliance Stuff

  A broad coalition of California businesses, nonprofits, healthcare providers, and community organizations formally launched a campaign this week to push for reform of the state law being weaponized against businesses that use standard website tools. The Reform CIPA Coalition is backing the revival of legislative efforts to limit the law’s scope and put a halt to the trend that has led to thousands of lawsuits and countless demand letters, arbitrations, and settlements. The coalition’s April 6 launch is a meaningful development and signals a renewed effort to push for a legislative fix that was paused last year. Here’s what you need to know and some steps you can take as the debate shakes out. The Law That Wasn’t Built for the Internet The California Invasion of Privacy Act (CIPA) was enacted in 1967 to address old-fashioned wiretapping and eavesdropping: phone calls, recording devices, and the kinds of things you’d expect to see in spy movies and soap operas . It was never desig...

A California bill aimed at curbing the explosion of lawsuits filed against businesses using common website tools like cookies, pixels, and session replay software has stalled out in the 2025 legislative session, meaning your business will remain vulnerable to the newest type of privacy litigation for at least the next year . Despite the Senate unanimously approving SB 690 just a month ago, the bill’s author announced on July 2 that it would be made into a “two-year bill” – meaning it will not advance further this year but may be taken up again in 2026. What does your business need to do to put yourself in the best position to defend against these California Invasion of Privacy Act (CIPA) wiretapping claims? CIPA’s Emergence as a Class Action Weapon CIPA was originally enacted in 1967 to combat traditional wiretapping and eavesdropping, primarily in the context of telephone communications. It was never designed to address the complexities of the digital age or regulate how businesses t...

  Quick Hits Businesses are facing a wave of lawsuits advancing novel legal theories targeting the use of website visitor tracking tools such as cookies, pixels, and web beacons . The suits allege these tools unlawfully track website visitors’ online activity and collect their information, such as visitors’ geographic and device information, and share that information with third parties for marketing purposes. Companies may want to determine whether their websites use the tools in question. If so, they may want to examine the extent to which the statute and its exceptions may apply and whether the website can be tweaked to buttress available defenses.   These lawsuits make generalized allegations that business websites use software or tools to collect various types of device and browsing information from website visitors and that businesses then share such information with other entities such as social media companies.  The claims invoke an obscure provision of the Calif...