WhatsApp Inc. v. NSO Group Technologies Limited

Background

The court considered the parties’ omnibus motions to seal portions of briefs and exhibits filed in connection with the parties’ summary-judgment motions and plaintiffs’ motion for sanctions. The court had previously denied requests to seal portions of the briefs and directed the parties to narrow their requests. Instead, each side filed a separate omnibus motion.

The court explained that federal court records are generally presumed to be available to the public. For materials connected to motions more than tangentially related to the merits, the party seeking secrecy must show “compelling reasons” for sealing. Materials connected to plaintiffs’ sanctions motion were subject to the less demanding “good cause” standard. The court also emphasized that parties should redact truly sensitive information rather than seal entire documents.

Plaintiffs’ motion

The court denied plaintiffs’ requests to seal entire exhibits 18 and 19 to the Block declaration, but allowed redaction of the “userid” column because it reasonably reflected personally identifiable information. The court reached the same result for exhibit 28 to that declaration and exhibits 40, 41, and 42 filed in opposition to defendants’ summary-judgment motion.

The court denied requests to seal damages-related and compensation-related information in specified exhibits, explaining that it would not be practical to conduct a damages trial while keeping all damages calculations secret. It also denied requests to seal several exhibits in their entirety based on generalized claims of sensitive business information.

The court granted other parts of plaintiffs’ motion. These included limited redactions of employee names in specified exhibits, financial information of non-parties in exhibits 19 and 20, and exhibit 21, which contained an unaffiliated individual’s email address, phone number, and other information. The court also granted the request concerning exhibit 15, which contained non-parties’ phone numbers and Internet Protocol addresses. Overall, plaintiffs’ omnibus motion to seal was granted in part and denied in part.

Defendants’ motion

For materials filed with defendants’ summary-judgment motion, the court denied requests to seal entire documents based on the presence of non-testifying employee names, generalized business-harm claims, client communications or information, contract details, or information about defendants’ compliance process. The court allowed defendants to redact source code from specified materials and personal phone numbers where identified.

The court granted defendants’ requests to seal several documents in their entirety and granted limited redactions in other specified declarations and exhibits. It denied other requested limited redactions that did not satisfy the compelling-reasons standard. The court did not consider a request concerning an exhibit that was not filed with the original motion. For another exhibit, the court treated the document as the same material addressed elsewhere and granted sealing for the specified redactions and exhibits. The court described defendants’ motion concerning materials submitted with the summary-judgment motions as granted in part and denied in part.

For materials filed with plaintiffs’ sanctions motion, the court denied defendants’ requests concerning numerous exhibits and portions of declarations because the requests were too broad. It granted requests to seal several exhibits in their entirety and granted redactions in portions of two declarations. The court described defendants’ motion concerning the sanctions materials as granted in part and denied in part.

Disposition

Judge Phyllis J. Hamilton granted in part and denied in part plaintiffs’ omnibus motion to seal and granted in part and denied in part defendants’ omnibus motion to seal. The parties were directed to re-file documents for which sealing was denied on the public docket by April 4, 2025. They were also directed to follow the order in future filings and to address at the pretrial conference how previously sealed documents would be re-filed to comply with the order.