Case Law & Court Rules

    On December 28, 2018, Google won summary judgment in a class action alleging that the company handles images in violation of the Illinois 2008 Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA). According to the District Court, “plaintiffs have not suffered an injury sufficient to establish Article III standing and their claims are dismissed.” In a (putative) class […]

On October 2, 2018, the European Courtof Human Rights (ECHR) found that the client has a right to consult his attorney before the judicial authority orders a new seizure of its electronic media storages. Not only: ff the applicant challenges the seizure for violation of the attorney-client privilege, the competent authorities are required to proceed […]

On April 23, 2020 a federal court officially approved the agreement reached between Facebook and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) last July. FTC’s investigation began after the events of Cambridge Analytica in 2018. See here for more about this investigation. The reached settlement agreement received some criticism. Facebook agreed to shift its approach to  privacy, […]

  On October 3, 2019 in Case C-18/18, Eva Glawischnig-Piesczek v. Facebook Ireland Limited, the European Court of Justice (EDJ) held that — under Directive 2000/31, the Directive on electronic commer – cefor a platform (host provider) to be considered hosting provider (and so benefit from liability exception), while it must play a passive role (having no knowledge of the content), must […]

On October 2, 2019, the UK Court of Appeal unanimously overturned a block on a “class-action” lawsuit (technically a “collective action”) brought by a veteran on behalf of millions iPhone users against  Google for the latter’s use of “Safari Workaround” . Now the case can be heard. The lawsuit alleges that Google secretly tracked some […]

Updated on October 18th, 2019: On August 8, 2019, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit held that the plaintiffs have constitutional standing to sue Facebook for violating statutory privacy rights under the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act of 2008. Facebook had filed a motion to dismiss arguing that plaintiffs lacked standing […]

On June 4, 2019, the Corte di Cassazione, the Italian Supreme Court, clarified the scope of the right of the public to be informed (also known as public right’s to know)  in relation to the right of the individual to be forgotten with reference to old news, which are being republished after many years. In this […]

  On July 29, 2019, the Court of Justice of the European Union (ECJ) published its judgement in case C-40/17, holding – like Advocate General Bobek (see here) suggested – that an organization who embeds a Facebook “Like” button on its website may be considered a data controller. In this case, a German fashion online […]

On July 9, 2019, the Court of Justice of the European Union heard oral arguments on a landmark case concerning Facebook’s transfer of personal data from the EU to the US on the basis of the currently utilized “standard contractual clauses” (SCCs) mechanism. See here for more info. The oral hearing took place in front […]

On July 9, 2019, the European Court of Justice (CJEU) heard oral arguments on a landmark case concerning Facebook’s transfer of personal data from the EU to the US on the basis of the currently utilized “standard contractual clauses” (SCCs) mechanism. The CJEU’s decision — will have tangible consequences for businesses performing data transfers from […]