A US federal judge yesterday dismissed a class action lawsuit
against internet advertising agency DoubleClick, ruling that the
company was not invading the privacy of individuals by placing
cookies on the hard drives of users.
The case was about DoubleClick’s use of cookies to build
profiles of internet users. A cookie is a small file that a web
site puts on a visitor’s hard disk, usually so that site can
remember something about the visitor at a later time. Visitors to
sites affiliated with DoubleClick had cookies installed on their
computers.
Some of those who downloaded cookies sued the company last year,
citing invasion of privacy by secretly collecting personal and
private data, such as e-mail addresses, unjust enrichment and
violation of federal laws against hacking or unauthorised access to
users’ data.
However, the New York Law Journal today reports that Judge Naomi
Reice Buchwald dismissed the case on the ground that those suing
had failed to state a viable claim, observing that they failed to
prove their assertion that the company’s access was unauthorised.
She added that collecting information with cookies did not break US
hacking laws.
According to the New York Law Journal, Judge Buchwald compared
the data stored in cookies to that which is “constantly collected
on all consumers” by retailers, observing that no US court has
ruled that such data damages consumers or constitutes unjust
enrichment to the collectors.
This success for DoubleClick follows a decision in January by
the Federal Trade Commission to drop an investigation into the
company’s privacy practices. The FTC was responding to similar
consumer concerns that DoubleClick could create personalised
profiles of them. However, it decided that the company’s use of
data was consistent with its own privacy policy.
