16-2613 Derek Gubala v. Time Warner Cable, Inc.

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7^th Circuit Court of Appeals

Case Name: Derek Gubala v. Time Warner Cable, Inc.

Case No.: 16-2613

Officials: POSNER, EASTERBROOK, and SYKES, Circuit Judges.

Time Warner Cable provides Internet access, television programming, and other online services to residences via cable. The plaintiff, Derek Gubala, subscribed to Time Warner’s cable services in 2004 and as required provided Time Warner with his date of birth, home address, home and work telephone numbers, social security number, and credit card information. Two years later, how ever, he cancelled his subscription and eight years after that (2014), upon inquiring of Time Warner, learned that all the information he’d given it when he’d subscribed to its residential services a decade earlier remained in the company’s possession. And in apparent (though, as explained later in this opinion, not certain) violation of federal law, none of it had been destroyed

Gubala filed this class-action suit against Time Warner Cable seeking injunctive relief (originally damages as well, but that claim has been abandoned) for alleged violations of 47 U.S.C. § 551(e), the subsection of the Cable Communications Policy Act which provides that a cable operator “shall destroy personally identifiable information if the information is no longer necessary for the purpose for which it was collected and there are no pending requests or orders for access to such information [either by a cable subscriber, seeking access to his own information] … or pursuant to a court order.” The district judge dismissed the suit on the ground that the plaintiff lacked standing to bring it. As an alternative ground for dismissal she ruled that even if the plaintiff had standing, he’d failed to state a claim upon which relief could be granted. He couldn’t be given an injunction, the only remedy he sought, because he had an adequate remedy at law—namely damages, authorized by section 551(f) of the Cable Act—that he had failed to seek.

Affirmed

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Attorney Derek A. Hawkins is the managing partner at Hawkins Law Offices LLC, where he heads up the firm’s startup law practice. He specializes in business formation, corporate governance, intellectual property protection, private equity and venture capital funding and mergers & acquisitions. Check out the website at www.hawkins-lawoffices.com or contact them at 262-737-8825.