Plaintiff Drops VPPA Suit Against 'The Onion'
The plaintiff in a Video Privacy Protection Act (VPPA) case against satirical news site The Onion voluntarily dropped the complaint in a court document Friday. No reason for the dismissal was given.
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Plaintiff Daniel McRitchie, an Onion subscriber, used its website to watch pre-recorded videos, whose titles were disclosed to Meta, along with his Facebook ID, according to the complaint in case 25-05471. The news site's deployment of a tracking pixel that transmitted his personally identifiable information to third parties without prior consent violated the VPPA, he alleged (see 2505200012).
The complaint also outlined how the generative AI service ChatGPT offers access to data disclosed to Meta via the tracking pixel. This specific distinction comes after the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the VPPA applies only to the disclosure of information that would allow an ordinary person to learn a specific individual's video-watching history (see 2505010046 and 2508200050).
The publication asked the U.S. District Court for Northern Illinois to drop the suit earlier this month on the grounds that the plaintiff lacked standing and because "courts are beginning to 'shut the door for Pixel-based VPPA claims'" (see 2508040053).