Twitter Privacy Class Action Lawsuit Voluntarily Dropped by User

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A Twitter user who claimed the social network illegally eavesdropped on private messages has decided to voluntarily drop the potential class action lawsuit.

Plaintiff Wilford Raney informed the court that after receiving documents and speaking with a Twitter representative, he determined to end all allegations that Twitter violated the Electronic Communications Privacy Act as well as California’s Invasion of Privacy Act.

The Twitter privacy class action lawsuit filed last September claimed the company would intercept direct messages, edit the hyperlinks within them and replace them with custom links which allows Twitter to monitor who clicks on the links through the social media website.

Raney alleged that by having to go through Twitter on the way to the intended website, Twitter benefits because its perceived value to third-party websites is increased.

By November, Raney asked the court to certify the Twitter privacy class action lawsuit with claims that millions of customers were affected by the intercepting of messages. In the Twitter lawsuit, Raney further alleged that Twitter did not ask for user consent before scanning their messages.

“The problem — and what triggered this lawsuit — is that Twitter users are never informed of (and thus could not possibly give consent to) Twitter’s practice of intercepting, reading and altering their private direct messages,” Raney argued. “Plaintiff therefore alleges that Twitter is violating millions of individuals’ privacy rights.”

That same month, Twitter filed a motion to dismiss the private message class action lawsuit stating that “Several courts have recognized that it is a routine business model for technology companies to provide free services funded by advertising.”

However, Twitter employee Sachin Agarwal, who oversees the Direct Message feature, told the court that “Twitter derives no direct revenue from identifying or processing links in DMs and does not serve advertising in DMs or through the DM service.”

Twitter further claimed that if the company stopped intercepting links through its server, customers would be open to online attacks.

Raney initially hoped to represent a huge amount of Class Members. In the original class action lawsuit, he claimed that Twitter has more than 1 billion users and 500 million tweets are transmitted daily.

The Twitter privacy class action sought financial damages of $100 per Class Member per day for each day of Twitter’s alleged violations as well as the discontinuation of the alleged scanning of private message.

While Raney dismissed the Twitter direct message class action lawsuit with prejudice, he left it open for potential Class Member to revive the suit.

Raney is represented by Todd Logan, Samuel M. Lasser, Rafey S. Balabanian, Alexander T.H. Nguyen and Amir C. Missaghi of Edelson PC.

The Twitter Privacy Class Action Lawsuit is Wilford Raney, et al. v. Twitter Inc., Case No. 3:15-cv-04191, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.