The litigation over Facebook's Tag Suggestions feature in
the United State District Court for the Northern District of
California continues, with the court this week denying both
sides' bids for summary judgment in a ten-page order. The case, formerly captioned
Patel v. Facebook and now going by the name of In re
Facebook Biometric Information Privacy Litigation, is on
course to proceed to trial in July.
The order contains a few items of interest, both legal and
technological. The court re-emphasized its earlier conclusion that
a violation of the notice and consent provisions of the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act
(BIPA), without any additional harm, could constitute an actual
injury sufficient to support a lawsuit. We noted last month that
the court's conclusion
may be in tension with recent Ninth Circuit precedent. The
court, however, did not appreciate Facebook's attempts to
re-litigate the issue, describing a "troubling theme in
Facebook's briefs" of
