On June 18, a California federal judge ruled that a proposed class action lawsuit against Alphabet Inc.’s Google can proceed, alleging violations of various laws, including those designed to protect children online.
U.S. District Judge P. Casey Pitts of the US District Court for the Northern District of California rejected Google’s attempts to dismiss the claims brought by parents who claim that their children’s data was collected without consent.
The lawsuit was filed in June 2023 by parents of six minors under the age of 13 in California, Florida, and New York, alleging that Google’s mobile advertising subsidiary, AdMob, collected their children’s personal information through mobile apps without parental consent.
Judge Pitts stated in his ruling, “Plaintiffs’ complaint here, when construed liberally, pleads facts demonstrating a potential factual dispute by sufficiently alleging that defendants’ purportedly unlawful conduct continued within the relevant statute-of-limitations period.”
In their complaint, the plaintiffs highlighted Google’s Designed for Families (DFF) program, which was launched in April 2015 to comply with COPPA regulations. However, a 2018 study by researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, found that developers in the DFF program were violating COPPA by surreptitiously tracking and collecting data.
Google attempted to dismiss the lawsuit, arguing that it was filed beyond the statutes of limitations, lacked standing, and failed to prove economic injury. However, Judge Pitts disagreed and allowed the lawsuit to proceed, stating that the plaintiffs have legal standing to seek injunctive relief.
“Here, plaintiffs have adequately pleaded that defendants were unjustly enriched by collecting plaintiffs’ personal information and employing it to target advertisements to children,” the judge concluded.
The Epoch Times reached out to a Google spokesperson for comment.
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