Court tosses privacy suit aimed at Hulu

The video streaming service Hulu has prevailed against a legal challenge claiming that it violated its users' privacy by sharing what they watched on Facebook. Magistrate Court Judge Laurel Beeler ruled that the company did not “knowingly” send information to Facebook to pair up with users’ profiles and distribute online. As a result, Judge Beeler tossed out the proposed class action lawsuit, settling a nearly four-year litigation battle that could have broad ripple effects for online privacy.

Hulu users trying to sue the company had taken issue with the fact that their Facebook accounts would update without their knowledge every time they clicked a “Like” button next to a Hulu video. That happened because cookies implanted by Facebook on their Web browsers would link those viewers with their Facebook accounts, so long as they had logged into the social network in the previous four weeks. Judge Beeler acknowledged that it would be natural to assume that information is constantly shared and connected between Internet companies. “But a jury cannot be allowed to pass on liability based on broad hand waves toward what we all know, what we all expect about how our personal information moves around, and how things generally work in the age of the Internet,” she wrote.