The Spokeo standing saga, which began in 2010,
continues with a second cert petition to the Supreme Court. The
case began when plaintiff filed a putative class action, alleging
that defendant Spokeo violated the Fair Credit Reporting Act (which
provides for actual or statutory damages) because its "people
search engine" published inaccurate data about him. The
district court found plaintiff lacked standing because he had not
suffered any actual damages; the Ninth Circuit reversed, holding
the statutory violation itself was sufficient.
In May 2016, the
Supreme Court vacated the Ninth Circuit decision on the
narrow basis that the circuit court failed to determine whether
plaintiff's injury was sufficiently concrete to confer Article
III standing. In so holding, the Supreme Court declined to address
the broader certified question as to whether Article III's
standing requirement is satisfied where the only harm alleged is
the violation of a statute. On remand, the
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