Supreme Court to weigh 1988 video privacy law in modern internet dispute

In 1988 Congress passed the Video Privacy Protection Act following a scandal over a judge’s video-rental records. Decades later, the law is being tested in a case where Michael Salazar says Paramount disclosed his newsletter subscription details to Facebook for targeted ads, invoking the Act’s consumer definition. Paramount counters that the statute was intended solely for video-service transactions and should not extend to non-video services like email newsletters.

The Motion Picture Association filed an amicus brief warning that an expansive interpretation could turn almost every internet user into a protected consumer, given the ubiquity of video content. The News/Media Alliance cautioned that a ruling in Salazar’s favor could force news sites to remove videos, paywall them, or abandon ad-based revenue models. Oral arguments before the Supreme Court are scheduled for Oct. 14, a decision that could reshape digital advertising and privacy law.