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A New York federal judge on Thursday shut down a proposed class action accusing HGTV’s parent company of secretly funneling viewers’ video-watching data to Facebook, ruling that the plaintiff failed to show the media giant disclosed information protected under federal video privacy law.

U.S. District Judge P. Kevin Castel dismissed the HGTV Meta Data Sharing lawsuit with prejudice, concluding that subscriber Constance Simon had standing to sue under the Video Privacy Protection Act, but could not demonstrate that Scripps Networks LLC transmitted “personally identifiable information” covered by the statute.

Simon, an HGTV newsletter subscriber who frequently streamed videos on hgtv.com, alleged that Scripps sent Facebook a trove of data via the platform’s tracking pixel — including video titles, URLs, Facebook IDs, and newsletter subscribers’ email addresses. But Judge Castel found that none of the information, as presented, could be used by an “ordinary person” to identify a specific user or connect them to a specific video.

Pixel Code Too Complex to Identify Viewers, Judge Says

Second Circuit Precedent Leaves Little Room for Plaintiffs

Judge Castel said Simon’s own pleadings undermined her theory of unlawful disclosure. By her description, the pixel sent “complex computer code” that an average consumer could not reasonably decipher — a fatal flaw under freshly clarified VPPA standards.

“The complaint supplies no allegations supporting an inference that an ordinary person could process the information from the pixel,” Castel wrote. Because the transmitted signals were technically dense and not human-readable, he concluded the claim “must fail.”

The judge leaned heavily on two recent Second Circuit decisions — Solomon v. Flipps Media and Hughes v. National Football League — which held that pixel-generated transmissions do not qualify as personally identifiable information unless an ordinary observer could interpret them without specialized tools. The appellate court declared that Solomon had “effectively shut the door” on pixel-based VPPA cases, and Judge Castel agreed, stating lower courts had “uniformly” applied that standard.

Simon’s screenshots of pixel code did little to help her case. “Outside of conclusory statements,” the judge said, she offered no explanation of how an average person could tie the code to a Facebook ID, browser identifier, or specific video titles.

Hashed Email Data Not Enough to Sustain the Claim

Simon also argued that Facebook received her hashed email address through the pixel’s “automatic advanced matching” feature. But the judge again found the allegation lacking, noting that hashed data is a nonreversible summary that an ordinary user cannot decode.

“There are no allegations showing that an ordinary person could identify, reverse, or even access the hashed data,” Castel wrote.

Because Simon could not show how she would fix the defects in a future amendment—especially in light of governing Second Circuit precedent—Judge Castel denied her request for leave to amend, calling further revisions “futile.”

Neither side’s attorneys could be reached for comment.

Simon is represented by Bursor & Fisher PA.
Scripps Networks LLC is represented by Weil Gotshal & Manges LLP.