In a recent legal development, a federal judge has ruled that a digital privacy class action lawsuit against the University of Maryland Medical System Corp. (UMMS) will be removed from district court jurisdiction and remanded as a state-court matter. This lawsuit accuses UMMS of embedding software on its websites which allegedly disseminated patients’ private health information to companies such as Facebook and Google.
The plaintiff in the case, identified only as Jane Doe, has taken up the fight individually and on behalf of others who are similarly affected. The class action complaint alleges that the UMMS has disclosed information about its patients, including details about their medical treatments, the hospitals they visited, and their identities. This information was allegedly transferred to companies like Facebook and Google through the tracking of pixels on their respective websites and health portals.
The presiding Senior District Judge Richard D. Bennett, granting the plaintiff’s motion, has made it clear that voluntary compliance with a federal program does not confer federal officer jurisdiction to this Court. Rather, the case will be remanded to the circuit court state level.
For additional reading, the full proceedings of the class action lawsuit can be found in Judge Bennett’sRuling.