KRISTEN HALL V. SMOSH DOT COM, INC., ET AL, No. 22-16216 (9th Cir. 2023)
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Plaintiff filed a lawsuit under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act alleging that Defendants sent text messages to a cell phone number that she had placed on the National Do-Not-Call Registry and provided to her thirteen-year-old son. The district court concluded that Plaintiff lacked Article III standing because she failed to allege that she was the “actual user” of the phone or the “actual recipient” of the text messages.
The Ninth Circuit reversed the district court’s dismissal. The panel held that the owner and subscriber of a phone with a number listed on the Do-Not-Call Registry has suffered an injury in fact sufficient to confer Article III standing when unsolicited telemarketing calls or texts are sent to the number in alleged violation of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act. The panel held that the owner and subscriber of the phone suffers a concrete, de facto injury when their right to be free from such communications is violated, even if the communications are intended for or solicited by another individual and even if someone else is using the phone at the time the messages are transmitted.
Court Description: Telephone Consumer Protection Act / Standing The panel reversed the district court’s dismissal, for lack of Article III standing, of an action under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act and remanded for further proceedings.
Plaintiff Kristen Hall alleged that defendants sent text messages to a cell phone number that she had placed on the National Do-Not-Call Registry and provided to her thirteen- year-old son. The district court concluded that Hall lacked Article III standing because she failed to allege that she was the “actual user” of the phone or the “actual recipient” of the text messages.
Reversing, the panel held that the owner and subscriber of a phone with a number listed on the Do-Not-Call Registry has suffered an injury in fact sufficient to confer Article III standing when unsolicited telemarketing calls or texts are sent to the number in alleged violation of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act. The panel held that the owner and subscriber of the phone suffers a concrete, de facto injury when their right to be free from such communications is violated, even if the communications are intended for or solicited by another individual, and even if someone else is using the phone at the time the messages are transmitted.
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