NEW YORK (Legal Newsline) - A New York federal judge has given preliminary approval to a class action settlement that gives lawyers up to $730,000 but class members $0.
The settlement with the media outlet The Epoch Times will terminate its use of the Facebook Pixel, a mechanism that gathers information to send to Facebook when visitors to Epoch view its video content. Many similar cases have been filed against other online video content providers.
On Jan. 22, Judge Alvin Hellerstein approved the settlement, which was announced to him in September and slightly changed in January. Epoch says it has already removed the Pixel and does not possess any class member's personally identifiable information.
It turned out Epoch was not a deep-pocket defendant who could withstand a monetary judgment on behalf of the many millions of visitors to its site. Epoch's marketing materials say there are 20 million unique digital users every month.
But there is no insurance, the sides say, and Epoch's finances do not permit a class-wide monetary settlement.
The plaintiff firms say the $730,000 requested fee award represents the amount its attorneys have worked on the case plus costs, without a multiplier.
Should Hellerstein find the amount inappropriate, it would not affect the settlement. The sides have agreed to not appeal whatever is awarded Lieff Cabraser and Carney Bate & Pullman, up to the $730,000 amount.
Earlier in the case, Hellerstein denied Epoch's motion to dismiss the case, which is brought under the Video Protection Privacy Act. Epoch sought permission to appeal but settled the case instead.
"By installing the pixel, Defendant opened a digital door and invited Facebook to enter that door and extract information from within," Hellerstein wrote.