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In re Google, Inc. Gmail Litigation

United States District Court for the Northern District of California

2013 WL 5423918 (2013)

Facts

The plaintiffs, who are both Gmail users and non-Gmail users, filed a multidistrict class-action suit against Google, Inc. (defendant) alleging Google violated the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) with its Gmail email service. Specifically, the plaintiffs alleged Google intentionally intercepted the contents of their email communications without consent. The plaintiffs claimed that Google intercepted this information to create user profiles for advertising-sales purposes. Gmail users were required to agree to Google’s terms of service. The terms of service reserved Google’s right to prescreen and remove any email content from its servers. This sentence was immediately followed in the same section by sentences about sexual and objectionable content. Further, Google’s privacy policy, which was referenced by the terms of service, stated Google would collect users’ information that the users provided to Google. Google filed a motion to dismiss, arguing that its practices were permitted under the ordinary-course-of-business exception to the ECPA. Google also argued that its practices were permitted because its users gave their consent to such practices through agreement to the terms of service and the privacy policy.

Rule of Law

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Issue

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Holding and Reasoning (Koh, J.)

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A "yes" or "no" answer to the question framed in the issue section;
A summary of the majority or plurality opinion, using the CREAC method; and
The procedural disposition (e.g., reversed and remanded, affirmed, etc.).

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