Williams v. DDR Media, LLC

Background

Loretta Williams filed a putative class action against DDR Media, LLC and Lead Intelligence Inc., doing business as Jornaya. Williams alleged that, during her visit to DDR Media’s website, snappyrent2own.com, Jornaya’s TCPA Guardian software captured her keystrokes, clicks, and other interactions, including her name, email address, and telephone number. She claimed that the software intercepted communications between her and the website and violated California Penal Code § 631(a), part of the California Invasion of Privacy Act.

Williams alleged that Jornaya violated the statute’s provision concerning reading or attempting to read the contents or meaning of electronic communications. She alleged that DDR Media was liable under another provision because it partnered with Jornaya. After earlier motions to dismiss, the court ordered targeted discovery about how TCPA Guardian operated and whether Jornaya read, attempted to read, or learned the contents of electronic communications.

The software and the parties’ arguments

Jornaya’s evidence showed that TCPA Guardian uses a JavaScript called LeadiD Create. The software generates a unique reference for a website visit and collects information about the website, disclosures, and visitor interactions. According to Jornaya’s evidence, information input by a visitor is automatically processed and converted into a fixed-length hash code when it reaches Jornaya’s servers. A hash is a one-way transformation that cannot be reversed to recover the original information. Jornaya stated that the original data remains only in temporary computer memory for milliseconds, is then overwritten, and is not stored on a persistent medium.

Jornaya argued that it could compare hash codes to verify whether information matched without retaining, reading, or learning the original information. Williams did not dispute the evidence describing the hashing process. Instead, she argued that Jornaya read or attempted to read the communications because the software first processed, evaluated, and formatted the input before hashing it. She also argued that California’s privacy law should be interpreted broadly.

Court’s reasoning

The court held that the statutory phrase “reads, or attempts to read, or to learn the contents or meaning” requires some effort to understand the substantive meaning of the communication. The court found that the undisputed evidence showed that TCPA Guardian automatically transformed the data into an incomprehensible hash, did not retain the original unhashed data, and did not attempt to understand the data’s substantive meaning.

The court rejected Williams’s argument that the initial formatting step constituted reading. It characterized that step as automatic and nearly instantaneous, without an effort to understand the information. The court also distinguished a case involving software that analyzed and interpreted online chats to create live transcripts, explaining that the evidence here showed no comparable analysis, interpretation, or storage of the original input.

Disposition

The court concluded that TCPA Guardian did not read, attempt to read, or learn the contents or message of the communications Williams entered on DDR Media’s website. The court therefore granted Jornaya’s motion for summary judgment and did not reach Jornaya’s other arguments for summary judgment. Because Williams’s claim against DDR Media was based on its alleged partnership with Jornaya, the court also granted summary judgment in favor of DDR Media. The court separately granted the unopposed administrative motion to file materials under seal.