Timothy Aguilar’s Oct. 13 complaint alleging that Network Insurance Senior Health Division (NISHD) hounded him with Medicare robocalls when he wasn’t even close to applying for benefits (see 2310200031) “fails to allege facts sufficient to state a cause of action,” said NISHD’s answer Monday (docket 4:23-cv-03988) in U.S. District Court for Southern Texas in Houston.

Snap CEO Evan Spiegel will appear before the Senate Judiciary Committee, the company said Monday after it announced subpoenas seeking testimony from Snap, X and Discord about children's online safety. The committee also said it’s in discussions about potential voluntary testimony from Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew.

LoanDepot didn’t “directly” violate the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, and plaintiff Kristi Hull “fails to allege a claim under any theory of vicarious liability,” said the mortgage lender’s answer Thursday (docket 1:23-cv-02567) in U.S. District Court for Colorado in Denver to Hull’s Oct. 2 complaint (see 2310030001). Court records show Hull’s complaint was the 28th TCPA action filed against loanDepot since May 2014. Hull alleges that loanDepot “incessantly” placed telemarketing calls to her cellphone, despite not having the “appropriate form of consent” to call her, and notwithstanding that her number was listed on the national do not call registry since August 2012. But Hull lacks Article III standing to bring her action because she didn’t suffer “an injury-in-fact as a result of loanDepot’s alleged conduct,” said loanDepot’s answer. The company said it didn’t willfully or knowingly contact Hull on the phone numbers at issue without prior express consent. LoanDepot said its actions “were proper and legal, and at all times it acted with good faith and without malice.” Application of the TCPA, as interpreted by the FCC, violates the First Amendment because such application relies on “content-based restrictions of protected speech,” said loanDepot’s answer. The statute also is unconstitutionally vague because TCPA restrictions don’t give “a person of ordinary intelligence adequate notice of the conduct that is prohibited,” said the lender. Any award of punitive or statutory damages against loanDepot would be unconstitutional “as violative” of the due process clause of the 14th Amendment and the excessive fines clause of the Eighth Amendment, it said. “The amount of damages prescribed by the TCPA statute are so severe and oppressive as to be wholly disproportionate to the offense and obviously unreasonable,” loanDepot said. “Any award of damages should be reduced to comport with due process,” it said.

“There is literally zero chance the FCC is going to rule in our favor” and reverse its rejection of LTD Broadband’s long-form application for the Rural Digital Opportunities Fund (RDOF) program, company CEO Corey Hauer said Thursday at a Minnesota Public Utilities Commission meeting. Even so, Hauer said the wireless ISP will continue to defend itself at the PUC and still wants to keep its eligible telecom carrier (ETC) designation in the state.

LA QUINTA, Calif. -- The FCC seemed more open to collaboration with states in its final NPRM for its rulemaking to possibly reclassify broadband as a Title II service, a California Public Utilities Commission staffer said during a panel Tuesday at NARUC’s meeting here. NARUC Telecom Committee Chairman Tim Schram told us Monday that the state regulator association would probably have a resolution about the FCC net neutrality rulemaking at its February meeting in Washington (see 2311130063).

FCC commissioners approved an open-ended notice of inquiry Wednesday that asked how AI can fight robocalls, as well as potential risks from the technology. Commissioners also approved an order providing survivors of domestic violence with safe and affordable access to communications and an order and Further NPRM protecting consumers from SIM swapping and port-out fraud. None of the items was controversial and all were approved 5-0.

Basket Entertainment, a developer of online games and mobile apps for the Roblox platform, hired John Cannata as a vice president and added him to its board in July to identify acquisition targets to grow its user base, but Cannata almost immediately “engaged in an outrageous campaign of double-dealing,” alleged Basket’s complaint Monday (docket 2:23-cv-01028) in U.S. District Court for Middle Florida in Fort Myers. Basket alleges Cannata went behind the company’s back and acquired ownership interests in at least two online games for himself “without ever presenting them as opportunities” to his employer, said the complaint. The “usurped games” continue to generate millions of dollars in monthly revenue for Cannata, who “actively concealed his misconduct,” and later “misrepresented his prior and ongoing negotiations and transactions” with the games’ creators, it said. Cannata also “surreptitiously acquired an interest in derivative games that directly compete” with Basket’s titles, it said. In so doing, Cannata “flagrantly breached the most basic fiduciary duties a director and officer owes to a corporation,” said the complaint. Cannata “usurped these lucrative corporate opportunities while Basket was in the middle of a capital raise, causing Basket reputational harm and disrupting cash flow that could have been used to acquire games,” it said. The 12-count complaint seeks compensatory damages and disgorgement of the profits Cannata earned, plus punitive damages “to the extent allowed by law to punish Cannata for the intentional wrongful acts.” Efforts to reach Cannata for comment Tuesday were unsuccessful.

The World Wildlife Fund “regrettably” devotes “a substantial portion” of its Sept. 14 motion to dismiss plaintiff Sonya Valenzuela’s privacy complaint attacking her and her counsel, said Valenzuela’s memorandum of points and authorities Thursday (docket 2:23-cv-06112) in U.S. District Court for Central California in Los Angeles in support of her opposition to the motion. Valenzuela alleges WWF invaded her privacy with its use of FullContact software to record and “deanonymize” internet protocol addresses when she used WWF’s website chat function (see 2307280032). WWF’s motion to dismiss asks the court “to draw adverse credibility inferences” about Valenzuela and her lawyer, Scott Ferrell of Pacific Trial Attorneys, on grounds that Valenzuela is a serial litigant, said her memorandum. But the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals recently made “exceptionally clear” that WWF’s tactics are “improper,” it said. The 9th Circuit held in its Jan. 23 decision in Langer v. Kiser that it’s “necessary and desirable” for committed individuals to bring serial litigation to enforce and advance consumer protection statutes, as Valenzuela “does here,” it said. WWF should be “sternly reminded” of the 9th Circuit’s “admonition” that courts mustn’t “discredit and/or penalize a plaintiff for being a litigation tester,” it said. WWF’s “implicit challenge” to Valenzuela’s standing to sue “is without merit,” said her memorandum. Though WWF doesn’t “expressly challenge” her standing to sue, its argument that she fails to allege any injury “should be construed as making that challenge,” it said. The 9th Circuit has held that claims under the California Invasion of Privacy Act, such as those that Valenzuela raises in her complaint, “protect concrete, substantive privacy interests, which is sufficient to confer standing,” it said.

FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr said during a Federalist Society panel discussion Friday that the Supreme Court’s growing focus on the major questions doctrine and the expected death of the Chevron doctrine (see 2306290063) has potential benefits in forcing lawmakers to make hard policy decisions.

An FCC NPRM released Thursday proposes allowing schools and libraries to apply for funding from the E-rate program for Wi-Fi hot spots and wireless internet access services that can be used off-premises. FCC Republican Commissioners Brendan Carr and Nathan Simington dissented, as they did last month on a declaratory ruling clarifying that the use of Wi-Fi on school buses is an educational purpose eligible for E-rate funding (see 2310190056).