On June 30, 2026, New Jersey’s Governor Mikie Sherrill signed a new data broker law, largely effective immediately, that adds significant new obligations for businesses involved in personal data sales. The law reaches traditional data brokers that collect or purchase personal data about consumers with whom they do not have a direct relationship and then…

DraftKings is the latest target in California’s wave of California Invasion of Privacy Act (CIPA) website-tracking litigation. In Hughes v. DraftKings Inc., filed in the Central District of California, plaintiff Dana Hughes alleges that DraftKings operated its website with data broker software from NextRoll, The Trade Desk, and Comscore that secretly collected data about website visitors, their…

For years, companies have treated anonymization as a legal comfort zone. Remove names, emails, phone numbers, and other identifiers, and the remaining dataset was often viewed as safer to share, analyze, monetize, and retain. That assumption is getting harder to defend. Artificial intelligence (AI) has changed the practical re-identification analysis by making it easier to…

A member of Kaiser Permanente, an integrated managed care consortium headquartered in Oakland, California, has asked a federal judge in Seattle to certify nationwide classes and California subclasses in a privacy lawsuit against Microsoft and Qualtrics over tracking technologies allegedly embedded in Kaiser’s website and patient portal. The plaintiff, identified as Jane Doe, claims that…

A California court just gave companies facing website tracking claims under the California Invasion of Privacy Act (CIPA) a very helpful ruling. In Blaker v. NetScout Systems, Inc., Case No. 25STCV31283 (May 27, 2026), the plaintiff claimed that NetScout violated California’s trap-and-trace law by using a software development kit (SDK) on its website that…

A recent Third Circuit decision gives companies another strong defense point in the wave of website tracking and session replay litigation, including claims brought under the California Invasion of Privacy Act (CIPA). In Smidga v. Spirit Airlines, the plaintiffs alleged that Spirit used session replay code to record website visitors’ interactions, including text entries…

The Texas Attorney General has filed a new consumer-protection lawsuit against Netflix, alleging that the company misled Texans by marketing itself as an ad-free, kid-friendly alternative to Big Tech while allegedly building a large-scale system for collecting and monetizing user data. The complaint claims that Netflix repeatedly assured consumers that its paid subscription model separated it…

California regulators have announced a major privacy settlement with General Motors (GM) over allegations that the company unlawfully sold the location and driving data of hundreds of thousands of Californians to two data brokers: Verisk Analytics and LexisNexis Risk Solutions. The settlement, subject to court approval, requires GM to pay $12.75 million in civil penalties…

California companies may have less time than they think to prepare for privacy audits. The California Privacy Protection Agency’s (CPPA) new Audits Division, created in February 2026, is expected to begin assessing companies’ compliance with the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) this year, according to Executive Director Tom Kemp. This is a notable remark because—while…