Justices signal they may let Paramount video-privacy suit proceed
At oral argument in Salazar v. Paramount Global, the Supreme Court appeared inclined to let a Tennessee man's lawsuit proceed under the 1988 Video Privacy Protection Act. The plaintiff claims Paramount shared information about videos he watched on 247Sports.com with Facebook through a tracking pixel without his consent. The law was passed after a journalist published Robert Bork's video rental history during his Supreme Court nomination fight.
The Video Privacy Protection Act arose from the 1987 fight over Robert Bork’s Supreme Court confirmation. A journalist obtained and published a list of movies Bork had rented; his nomination failed in a 58–42 Senate vote. Congress then barred video-service companies from knowingly disclosing identifiable customer information.
Michael Salazar subscribed in 2022 to a Paramount-owned college sports recruiting site’s email newsletter. He says he watched videos there while signed into Facebook, and that a tracking pixel sent his viewing data to Facebook without permission. Lower courts dismissed his case, finding he was not a “consumer” under the statute.
If the Court allows the suit, online publishers and retailers that embed tracking tools could face greater exposure under a decades-old privacy statute. Consumers may gain more leverage over how their viewing habits are shared, while companies might respond by seeking clearer consent or narrowing data collection. The ruling could also clarify how broadly courts read “consumer” and “video tape service provider,” affecting similar class actions beyond Paramount.