Consumer Protection

  • February 05, 2025

    Mercedes-Benz Defective Brake Suit Narrowed Again

    A Washington federal judge has again narrowed a proposed class action against Mercedes-Benz over defective braking systems in SUVs, dismissing claims that the automaker fraudulently concealed the issue but allowing allegations that it unfairly shifted repair costs to customers.

  • February 05, 2025

    Crypto Expert Witness Ruling Flouts Precedent, Justices Told

    The founder of cryptocurrency service Tornado Cash has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to undo what he called an "unprecedented" order from a Manhattan federal judge to disclose whom he might call as an expert witness at his upcoming money laundering and sanctions-dodging trial.

  • February 05, 2025

    Judge Found 'Vertical' Mattress Deal Won't Hurt Competition

    U.S. District Judge Charles Eskridge rejected the Federal Trade Commission's bid to pause Tempur Sealy's planned $5 billion purchase of Mattress Firm after finding a merger of the mattress supplier and retail chain would likely increase competition, if it has any impact at all.

  • February 05, 2025

    'Pay-To-Pay' Fees Are Unfair Debt Practice, 11th Circ. Rules

    The Eleventh Circuit said a mortgage servicing company illegally charged borrowers fees for online and phone payments, upholding a Florida federal court's decision that it improperly collected so-called pay-to-pay convenience fees that were not expressly allowed by underlying loan agreements.

  • February 05, 2025

    6th Circ. Won't Revisit Home Depot Data Breach Coverage Suit

    The Sixth Circuit refused Wednesday to review its January finding that an electronic data exclusion in Home Depot's commercial general liability policies barred coverage for the retail giant's $50 million claim for defense and settlement costs over a 2014 data breach.

  • February 05, 2025

    LA City Atty Says Rental Startup Price-Gouged During Fires

    The Los Angeles City Attorney's Office on Tuesday accused furnished rental startup Blueground of illegally profiting from the destructive wildfires that broke out in Los Angeles last month, saying in a complaint filed in state court that Blueground jacked up rental prices, including in evacuation zones.

  • February 05, 2025

    Senate Panel Approves Car AM Radio, Rural Broadband Bills

    A key Senate panel signed off on legislation Wednesday to require the continued installment of AM radio capability in cars, as well as to more thoroughly vet broadband providers that want to participate in federally funded deployment programs.

  • February 05, 2025

    Insurers Sued Over $8M In Water Damage At Wash. Condos

    Farmers and Western National have allegedly breached their property insurance policies by refusing to cover nearly $8 million in hidden water damage at two Seattle-area condominium complexes, according to separate complaints filed by the condo owners associations.

  • February 05, 2025

    Paxos' Top Atty Takes CLO Spot At Crypto Co. Kraken

    Cryptocurrency exchange Kraken has tapped the general counsel at crypto trust company Paxos to serve as its new chief legal officer.

  • February 05, 2025

    Meta Can't Ask Mass. AG To Dig Up Docs From State Agencies

    The Massachusetts Attorney General's Office is not obligated to search for and turn over documents held by other state agencies that Meta Platforms is seeking in the state's lawsuit alleging Instagram is harming children and teens, a judge ordered.

  • February 04, 2025

    Judge Asks If ZoomInfo Search Result Ads Violate Privacy

    A Washington federal judge asked Tuesday if the use of a plaintiff's name to search ZoomInfo's vast database violated state privacy and publicity law because the search result included ads for other products.

  • February 04, 2025

    FINRA Fines Broker $3.2M Over Securities Lending Biz

    Broker-dealer Apex Clearing Corp. has agreed to pay the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority $3.2 million to end first-of-its-kind claims that the firm failed to abide by customer protection rules with its fully paid securities lending program, including by misrepresenting how it would compensate participants, leaving certain customers vulnerable to potential tax consequences.

  • February 04, 2025

    Whirlpool Sinks Customer's Suit Over Service Plan Repair

    A Washington federal judge has tossed a customer's proposed class action over a dishwasher warranty for good, finding no "reasonable consumer" would have been misled to believe the terms covered the full cost of any repair given the "caveats" on marketing materials.

  • February 04, 2025

    Wells Fargo Clears 2 More Consent Orders Amid Rehab Efforts

    The Federal Reserve said Tuesday that Wells Fargo & Co. has exited a pair of mortgage-related consent orders from more than a decade ago, another step forward in the banking giant's regulatory rehabilitation efforts.

  • February 04, 2025

    Sen. Banking Chair Sets 100-Day Dash For Crypto Legislation

    Senate Banking Committee Chair Tim Scott, R-S.C., said Tuesday that he intends to pass crypto legislation out of his chamber in the first 100 days of the new administration with the help of a working group composed of committee chairs in both chambers of Congress.

  • February 04, 2025

    Google Gets OkCaller's 'Incoherent' Antitrust Claims Tossed

    A Florida federal judge on Tuesday tossed for good antitrust claims from the company behind reverse phone number lookup website OkCaller.com, saying the newly amended suit does not rectify the previous problems, or if it does, the court cannot decipher the "incoherent" arguments. 

  • February 04, 2025

    FCC Floats $4.4M Robocall Fine Against Telecom Network

    The Federal Communications Commission on Tuesday proposed a fine of more than $4.4 million against a Chicago-based telecom that the agency accused of allowing government impostor calls on its network.

  • February 04, 2025

    FCC Drops 5th Circ. Defense Of Nonbinary Gender Category

    The Federal Communications Commission will no longer defend a nonbinary gender category on its employment diversity forms amid challenges brought by religious broadcasters in the Fifth Circuit, where judges grilled the FCC on Tuesday about its authority to collect and publish industry data on employee diversity.

  • February 04, 2025

    LinkedIn Shares Users' Info With Meta And Adobe, Suit Says

    LinkedIn has been hit with a proposed class action in California federal court alleging it illegally shared with Meta and Adobe personal information belonging to its LinkedIn premium subscribers who watched online training courses on its LinkedIn Learning platform without their knowledge or permission.

  • February 04, 2025

    LendingTree Faces Consumer Claims Over Snowflake Breach

    Online consumer lending platform LendingTree and an insurance comparison subsidiary are facing a proposed consumer class action based on a data breach of their cloud storage service, which affected personal information for "hundreds of millions of consumers."

  • February 04, 2025

    Sens. Hawley, Sanders Pitch 10% Cap On Credit Card Rate

    Sens. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., and Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., introduced bipartisan legislation Tuesday that would hold President Donald Trump to his campaign promise of a 10% credit card interest rate cap.

  • February 04, 2025

    Sen. Mike Lee To Head Antitrust Subcommittee

    Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, a frequent critic of the Federal Trade Commission, will serve as chairman of the Senate subcommittee on antitrust and consumer protection issues, with Sen. Corey Booker, D-N.J., taking over the ranking member role.

  • February 04, 2025

    SEC Could Greenlight Crypto Trading Under New Task Force

    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's new crypto task force could bless the trading of certain tokens on nonregulated exchanges as the industry awaits agency rulemaking or legislation setting out the new rules of the road for crypto, the task force's leader said Tuesday in a statement laying out her agenda.

  • February 04, 2025

    Robinhood Halts Super Bowl Offerings After Request By CFTC

    Robinhood Markets' derivatives subsidiary pulled back its planned offering of Super Bowl online trading markets on Tuesday, one day after announcing the offering, saying the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission requested that it stop.

  • February 04, 2025

    Norfolk Southern Hit With 'Toxic Nightmare' Derailment Suit

    Hundreds of Ohio and Pennsylvania residents affected by the fallout of the Feb. 3, 2023, Norfolk Southern train derailment have accused the rail company, government agencies and several businesses of downplaying the ongoing harm of the incident, marking one of the latest lawsuits filed on or near the two-year milestone.

Expert Analysis

  • Key Takeaways From FDA's Latest Social Media Warnings

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    The U.S. Food and Drug Administration's latest untitled letter concerning a drug company's social media promotion provides lessons for how companies should navigate risk presentation, FDA labeling requirements and superiority claims, say attorneys at Sheppard Mullin.

  • 2 Cases Show DAOs May Face Increasing Legal Scrutiny

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    Two ongoing cases that recently survived motions to dismiss in California federal courts concerning Compound DAO and Lido DAO threaten to expand the potential liability for activity attributed to decentralized autonomous organizations — and to indirectly create liability for their participants, say attorneys at Cahill Gordon.

  • Expect More State Scrutiny Of PE In Healthcare M&A

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    While a California bill that called for increased antitrust scrutiny of many healthcare private equity transactions was recently vetoed by the governor, state legislatures are likely to continue introducing similar laws, particularly if the Trump administration eases federal enforcement, say attorneys at Morgan Lewis.

  • How CFIUS' Updated Framework Affects Global Investors

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    The recent change to the monitoring and enforcement regulations governing the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States will broaden administrative practices around nonnotified transaction investigations, increase the scope of information demands from the committee and accelerate its ability to impose mitigation on parties, say attorneys at Simpson Thacher.

  • Service Providers Must Mitigate 'Secondary Target' Risks

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    A lawsuit recently filed in an Illinois federal court against marketing agency Publicis over its work for opioid manufacturers highlights an uptick in litigation against professional service providers hired by clients that engaged in alleged misconduct — so potential targets of such suits should be sure to conduct proper risk analysis and mitigation, say attorneys at Dechert.

  • 5 Ways SEC's Crypto Approach Could Change Under Trump

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    Given the Trump campaign's procrypto stance, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission could take a number of different approaches to crypto policy in the next administration, including pausing registration-only enforcement actions and proposing tailored rules that take into account the differences between crypto-assets and traditional securities, say attorneys at WilmerHale.

  • Opinion

    FTC Actions In Oil Cases Go Against Its Own Rulemaking

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    Two recent Federal Trade Commission actions concerning the oil and gas industry appear to defy its own merger guidelines, with allegations that fall far short of the commission's own standard — raising serious questions about the agency's current approach, say attorneys at Clifford Chance.

  • Series

    Flying Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    Achieving my childhood dream of flying airplanes made me a better lawyer — and a better person — because it taught me I can conquer difficult goals when I leave my comfort zone, focus on the demands of the moment and commit to honing my skills, says Ivy Cadle at Baker Donelson.

  • 9th Circ.'s High Bar May Limit Keyword Confusion TM Claims

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    A recent Ninth Circuit ruling that a law firm did not infringe upon a competitor’s trademarks by paying Google to promote its website when users searched for the rival’s name signals that plaintiffs likely can no longer win infringement suits by claiming competitive keyword advertising confuses internet-savvy consumers, say attorneys at Mitchell Silberberg.

  • 'Reverse Redlining' Suit Reveals Language Risks For Lenders

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    The Justice Department's case against consumer finance provider Colony Ridge highlights the government's focus on lending to consumers with limited English proficiency and the risks of generating marketing materials in other languages while conducting actual transactions in English, say attorneys at Goodwin.

  • What Trump's Next Term May Mean For Biz Immigration

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    Leonard D'Arrigo at Harris Beach discusses the employment-based immigration policies businesses can potentially expect during President-elect Donald Trump’s second term, based on policies enacted during his first administration, statements made during his campaign and proposals in Project 2025.

  • Takeaways From Final Regulations For China Investment Ban

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    ​The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s final rule banning U.S. investment in emerging Chinese technology clarifies some key requirements, includes additional exceptions for covered transactions and attempts to address concerns that the rule will put U.S. businesses at a competitive disadvantage, say attorneys at Simpson Thacher.

  • Compliance Considerations Of DOJ Data Security Rule

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    Under the U.S. Department of Justice's proposed rule aiming to prevent certain countries' access to bulk U.S. sensitive personal data, companies must ensure their vendor, employment and investment agreements meet strict new data security requirements — or determine whether such contracts are worth the cost of compliance, say attorneys at Eversheds Sutherland.

  • Balancing Health Tech Advances And Clinical Responsibility

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    To maintain their clinical responsibilities and mitigate potential legal risk, health professionals should incorporate the benefits of new medical technology powered by artificial intelligence while addressing its risks and limitations, says Kathleen Fisher Enyeart at Lathrop GPM.

  • Defense Insights As PFAS Consumer Product Claims Rise

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    Amid the recent proliferation of lawsuits seeking damages for failure to disclose the presence of PFAS in consumer products, manufacturers, distributors and consumer product companies should follow the science and consider a significant flaw in many of the filings, say attorneys at Farella Braun.

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