The number of cases alleging violations of the 1988 Video Privacy Protection Act has risen in recent years and seems likely to continue to grow after an October decision by the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, privacy lawyers said in interviews. The VPPA was intended to protect the privacy of an individual’s video store rentals. However, in the past decade or so, its reach has widened to include streaming services, said Matthew Wolfe, a Shook Hardy privacy attorney.
Digital assistant Siri was engineered to protect user privacy and audio recordings of its interactions have never been sold or stored without consent, Apple said Tuesday after agreeing to a $95 million settlement in a lawsuit that alleged Siri routinely recorded private conversations.
New York state legislators opened their 2025 session Wednesday, introducing comprehensive and healthcare-focused privacy bills, among other measures related to consumer data. Assemblymember Nily Rozic (D) offered the 2025 version of the New York Privacy Act. However, some of it is "not aligned with other comprehensive privacy laws,” which could make compliance a challenge for businesses, warned Hinshaw & Culbertson privacy attorney Cathy Mulrow-Peattie in an email Wednesday.
In what one privacy expert called a "dam-bursting moment," the European Court of Justice's General Court Wednesday ordered the European Commission (EC) to pay $412 (400 euros) to a German visitor to one of its websites because the site unlawfully transferred his personal data to the U.S. (Case T-354/22/ Bindl v. Commission). The EC said it would "carefully study" the judgment and its implications.
GameStop and the plaintiffs in a class-action suit alleging violation of the Video Privacy Protection Act (VPPA) agreed to dismiss the lawsuit, the parties announced in a joint stipulation of dismissal at U.S. District Court of New York Monday.