A California federal judge said Monday he will not end a 2019 consent decree the government reached with TikTok Inc. predecessor Musical.ly over its collection of data on kids under 13 just because the U.S. Department of Justice is asking him to, saying the DOJ gave him no information about why he should.
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TOP NEWS

'So What?': Judge Pans DOJ Bid To End TikTok Consent Decree

By Craig Clough

A California federal judge said Monday he will not end a 2019 consent decree the government reached with TikTok Inc. predecessor Musical.ly over its collection of data on kids under 13 just because the U.S. Department of Justice is asking him to, saying the DOJ gave him no information about why he should.

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Anthropic Can't Shake Reddit's AI Content-Scraping Suit

By Lauren Berg

A San Francisco judge largely rejected Anthropic's bid to toss Reddit Inc.'s suit accusing it of improperly gathering user content to train its artificial intelligence products, finding that most of Reddit's allegations have extra elements exempting them from federal preemption.

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Microsoft Faces Encryption Patent Suit Over Teams And Azure

By Ryan Davis

A new lawsuit alleges Microsoft's Teams and Azure platforms infringe five patents originally issued to secure messaging company Cyph Inc., which was founded by former SpaceX engineers.

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Insider Critiques Of Meta Came From Ignorance, Jury Told

By Cara Salvatore

A Meta vice president testified before a New Mexico state jury Monday that, "with all due respect," criticisms of the company's data handling from investigation partner Gibson Dunn and from then-Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg were born of a lack of understanding.

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Meta Trims But Can't End Cybersecurity Pro's Retaliation Suit

By Lauren Berg

The former head of cybersecurity at messaging platform WhatsApp can pursue some, but not all, of his whistleblower retaliation suit against Meta Platforms, a California federal judge has ruled, saying the complaint plausibly alleges protected activity regarding his reports that claim Meta violated U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission rules.

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Minn. AG Says X Lacks Standing To Challenge Deepfake Law

By Corey Rothauser

Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison has urged a federal judge to dismiss X Corp.'s amended challenge to the state's election deepfake law, arguing Elon Musk's social media company still has not shown it faced a credible threat of prosecution.

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Greenberg Traurig Hit With Action Over Client Data Breach

By Matt Perez

A proposed class of Greenberg Traurig LLP clients said the New York law firm failed to secure their personal data prior to a preventable data breach and delayed notifying clients of the breach for two weeks, in an action filed over the weekend in New York federal court seeking injunctive and other equitable relief to protect client data.

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ENFORCEMENT

Ex-NFL Player Gets New Trial In $328M Medicare Fraud Case

By Elaine Briseño

A Texas federal judge has granted a new trial for a former NFL player convicted in a $328 million Medicare billing scheme, finding that the government presented unreliable testimony and did not identify the alleged lies the defendant used to influence physicians.

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LITIGATION

ADM Faces Class Action Over Purported Dark Web Data Leak

By Joyce Hanson

A former Archer-Daniels-Midland Co. employee filed a proposed class action in Illinois federal court claiming the agricultural giant failed to protect workers' personal information during a ransomware attack this month that has been attributed to a cybercrime group.

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AI Cos. Hit With Antitrust Suit Over Deal To 'Pace The Frontier'

By Aneeta Mathur-Ashton

Artifical intelligence users in Florida and California have accused Anthropic, OpenAI, SpaceX and Google of illegally restraining competition by publicly agreeing to "pace the frontier" and collectively slow down their AI development.

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British Columbia Joins In Blaming OpenAI In School Shooting

By Rae Ann Varona

The Canadian province of British Columbia on Monday became the latest to sue artificial intelligence company OpenAI over a deadly February shooting at a small-town school, telling a California federal court that company leadership rejected an internal recommendation to notify law enforcement of the shooter's ChatGPT communications that company staff flagged as dangerous.

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Catching Up With Delaware's Chancery Court

By Jarek Rutz

The Delaware Chancery Court this past week dismissed a challenge to Alteryx Inc.'s $4.4 billion take-private sale, resolved a fight over the removal of a security technology company's director and declined to let Empery Digital Inc. immediately appeal a proxy contest ruling.

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EXPERT ANALYSIS

How Calif. Privacy Bill Could Change CIPA Tracking Cases

If California Gov. Gavin Newsom signs S.B. 690, the bill could materially reduce the leverage behind a pen-register-only claim or demand, so California Invasion of Privacy Act website tracking claims should not be evaluated the same way they were six months ago, says Alexandra Samofalova at Spencer Fane.

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LEGAL INDUSTRY

Legal Deserts: Millions Across America Struggle To Access Lawyers

Tens of millions of Americans live in towns and counties across the nation with limited or no access to legal services. By one estimate, at least a third of the nation's counties qualify as a "legal desert," having only one or no attorney per 1,000 residents. Roughly 24 million Americans reside in these counties.

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Tesla Atty Misled Witness Days Before Bias Trial, Judge Hears

By Dorothy Atkins

The California Civil Rights Department asked a California judge for a protective order Monday on the first day of a bench trial over claims Tesla Inc. fostered racism at its Fremont factory, after a witness testified that an in-house Tesla attorney recently called him and misled him into believing he represented the agency.

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New Calif. Law Bars Legal Funders From Influencing Litigation

By Jack Karp

Corporate investors and litigation funders will be barred from influencing litigation strategy in California under a new bill signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom.

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Q&A

She Has A Point: Fenwick's Jessica Kaempf

By Theresa Schliep

Jessica Kaempf of Fenwick & West LLP is a pragmatic yet tenacious attorney whose representation of her clients has earned her plaudits from Kathi Vidal of Winston Taylor, who praised Kaempf as part of a Law360 series celebrating women litigators.

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$1.35M Class Deal Reached Over Botched Calif. Bar Exam

By Emily Johnson

Takers of the February 2025 California bar exam that was marred by technical failures have agreed to settle their proposed class action against the proctor for $1.35 million, while the company also agreed to complete quality checks before proctoring future bar examinations, according to a motion seeking preliminary approval in federal court.

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Ex-Prosecutor Escapes Jan. 6 Atty's Defamation Suit

By Jared Foretek

Former federal prosecutor Andrew Weissmann on Monday won judgment on the pleadings in a defamation case brought by attorney Stefan Passantino, who had represented Cassidy Hutchinson, after Passantino alleged Weissmann had defamed him when saying he'd "coached" Hutchinson "to lie" to the January 6th Select Committee.

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LAW FIRMS IN TODAY'S NEWS

Arenson Dittmar

Baker Donelson

Binnall Law Group

Cahill Gordon

Cole Schotz

Conrad Metlitzky

Desmarais LLP

DiCello Levitt

Dunn Isaacson Rhee

Esbrook PC

Fenwick & West

Gibson Dunn

Greenberg Traurig

McGinn Montoya

Michael Best & Friedrich

Morrison & Foerster

Munger Tolles

O'Melveny & Myers

Paul Hastings

Polsinelli PC

Potomac Law Group

Quinn Emanuel

Sauder Schelkopf

Schonbrun Seplow

Selendy Gay

Spencer Fane

Stranch Jennings

Strauss Borrelli

Tycko & Zavareei

Whalen Law Office

Williams & Connolly

Winston Taylor

COMPANIES IN TODAY'S NEWS

Alteryx Inc.

Anthropic PBC

Archer-Daniels-Midland Co.

Burger King Holdings Inc.

ByteDance Ltd.

Carrols Restaurant Group Inc.

Clearlake Capital Group LLC

Consumer Attorneys of California

Databricks Inc.

Evercore Inc.

Financial Industry Regulatory Authority Inc.

Google LLC

Inovalon Holdings Inc.

Insight Venture Management LLC

Intel Corp.

JPMorgan Chase & Co.

Jefferies Financial Group Inc.

LinkedIn Corp.

Meta Platforms Inc.

Microsoft Corp.

Mobileum Inc.

New York University

Nordic Capital Ltd.

OpenAI OpCo LLC

Reddit Inc.

Restaurant Brands International Inc.

Space Exploration Technologies Corp.

State Bar of California

Tesla Inc.

TikTok Inc.

Wells Fargo & Co.

X Corp.

GOVERNMENT AGENCIES IN TODAY'S NEWS

California Civil Rights Department

Delaware Court of Chancery

Equal Employment Opportunity Commission

Federal Trade Commission

Minnesota Attorney General's Office

New Mexico Attorney General's Office

Occupational Safety and Health Administration

Royal Canadian Mounted Police

U.S. Attorney's Office for the Northern District of Texas

U.S. Department of Justice

U.S. District Court for the Central District of California

U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia

U.S. District Court for the District of Minnesota

U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas

U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California

U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois

U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas

U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York

U.S. Marine Corps

U.S. Patent and Trademark Office

U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission