Facebook is being sued in a $15 billion lawsuit alleging that the popular social media company secretly tracked the Internet activity of its users after they log off (the First Amended Complaint is available here).  The case is a consolidation of nearly two dozen lawsuits filed in ten states, including one here in Hawaii (Quinn v. Facebook, Inc., 1:11-cv-00623).  The lawsuit alleges violations of the U.S. Wiretap Act, the Stored Communications Act, and Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.

In July, Facebook filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit on the ground that the plaintiffs failed to allege sufficient injury.  At the hearing on the motion on October 5, Facebook’s attorneys argued that the plaintiffs haven’t identified the websites they visited, the kind of information that Facebook collected, or whether Facebook disclosed any information to anyone else.  The lawyer representing the subscribers countered that generalized allegations of harm are sufficient at this stage of the case, and that Facebook’s alleged practice of tracking their users’ Internet activity was not disclosed as part of Facebook’s privacy policy.   The court’s ruling on the motion to dismiss is pending.