Meta Gets Extension to Dec. 8 to Respond to Pixel Privacy Class Action

The U.S. District Court for Middle North Carolina in Winston-Salem, in a text-only order Friday (docket (1:22-cv-00727), granted Meta’s motion for a deadline extension to Dec. 8 to answer the Sept. 1 class action in which plaintiffs allege Facebook’s Pixel tracking tool violated their medical privacy.

“Good cause” exists to extend Meta’s time to respond because Meta’s Oct. 22 joint motion with the plaintiffs to sever the case and transfer it to Northern California (see 2210240002) is pending, said Meta’s Thursday motion. If and when the court grants the joint motion, “an extension will permit Meta time to take the procedural steps necessary to consolidate the severed claims” with In re Meta Pixel Healthcare Litigation (docket 3:22-cv-3580), said Meta.

The litigation involves six other recently consolidated, nearly identical cases currently proceeding before U.S. District Judge William Orrick in San Francisco. Orrick scheduled a hybrid Zoom and in-person hearing for Wednesday at 2 p.m. PST on the California plaintiffs’ Aug. 25 motion for a preliminary injunction prohibiting Meta from intercepting patient information and communications from health care entities covered under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act through its use of the Pixel tracking tool.

The injunction would also bar Meta from disseminating or using patient information and communications that it has intercepted from HIPAA-covered entities through its use of the Pixel tool. “On a daily basis, Meta intercepts personally identifiable medical information and the content of patient communications which it then monetizes for its own financial gain,” said the injunction motion. Meta’s unlawful conduct “will continue to affect patients of medical providers around the country” without court intervention, it said.

Meta's defense is that third-party web developers, not Meta itself, decide how to configure the code on their websites to send their chosen information to the platform. Meta already takes extensive measures to prevent third-party developers from sending it sensitive information, it said.

Meta’s co-defendants in the Winston-Salem class action are the Duke University and WakeMed health systems. The case remains unassigned to a judge.