Magazine Publishers Escape Class Action Lawsuit Over Marketing Practices

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals on Tuesday struck down two separate class action lawsuits accusing magazine publishing giants Hearst Communications Inc. and Conde Nast Publications of secretly sharing subscribers’ personal information with third-party marketers, ruling that plaintiffs had not sufficiently proven they were injured by the companies’ lack of disclosures under California’s “Shine the Light” law.

The Shine the Light law is a California statute that protects consumers from companies that collect and surreptitiously share their sensitive personal information with third parties. The law requires businesses to establish a procedure by which customers can receive an explanation of how their personal information is disclosed to third parties.

The Ninth Circuit noted in its Nov. 18 rulings, however, that companies are required to provide the “identity of the third parties and the types of personal information revealed to them.”

That secondary requirement is also a key factor in the success of any lawsuit citing the “Shine the Light” statute. The California Court of Appeals ruled in December 2013 that “a plaintiff must have suffered a statutory injury to have standing” and to do so “must have made, or attempted to make, a disclosure request in order to have standing under the STL.”

Neither plaintiff Brian King, who had alleged that publishing giant Conde Nast had sold his information without notifying him, nor plaintiff Melissa Miller, who had made similar claims against Hearst Communications, had requested the disclosure required under the statute, the Ninth Circuit wrote in the opinion. As such, they could not continue to bring claims under their respective class action lawsuits.

While the Ninth Circuit could have done a separate review, it noted that the California Court of Appeals’ decision did not seem to go against state precedent regarding the Shine the Light statute and similar laws and, moreover, that “there is no convincing evidence that the state Supreme Court would decide differently.”

The plaintiffs in both class action lawsuits are represented by  Edelson PC and Sean Reis of The Reis Law Firm APC.

The Magazine Marketing Privacy Class Action Lawsuits are Miller v. Hearst Communications Inc., Case No. 12-cv-57231; and King v. Conde Nast Publications, Case No. 12-cv-57209, U.S. Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.