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Did LabMD, the now-defunct cancer testing company, expose sensitive patient information with shoddy data security practices as U.S. regulations have charged, or was the company victimized by a private forensics firm extorting it for business? This raises the troubling question of whether the entire case against LabMD was built on a false premise.

Did LabMD, the now-defunct cancer testing company, expose sensitive patient information with shoddy data security practices as U.S. regulations have charged, or was the company victimized by a private forensics firm extorting it for business – raising the troubling question of whether the entire case against LabMD was built on a false premise.

Yesterday morning, the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, sitting in Miami, heard oral argument in the case of LabMD, Inc. v. Federal Trade Commission, No. 16-16270.

For purposes of this post, we presume readers are familiar with this case, which we’ve blogged about extensively since the Federal Trade Commission lodged an Administrative Complaint against LabMD back in 2013.  Briefly, the core question on appeal is whether the FTC overstepped its authority under Section 5(n) of the Federal Trade Commission Act (codified at 15 U.S.C. § 45(n)) when it initiated an enforcement action against LabMD, a Georgia medical testing lab, after certain patient data files were apparently misappropriated, but no patent data actually fell into the wrong hands, and no individual patient suffered any cognizable injury, such as identity theft.

In a long-running and highly contentious data security enforcement action against LabMD, a small medical testing laboratory, the Federal Trade Commission was handed a stunning defeat late Friday.  In a 92-page Initial Decision, Chief Administrative Law Judge D. Michael Chappell dismissed the FTC’s case against LabMD – after a full administrative trial – based on the Commission’s failure to prove it was “likely” that consumers had been substantially injured in two alleged data security incidents dating back nearly seven years.

A federal judge in New York has dismissed LabMD’s lawsuit against a former United States Attorney – which charged her with ethics violations and engaging in a cover-up over her role in an U.S. Federal Trade Commission data security enforcement action – on jurisdictional grounds.

The legal wrangling between the Federal Trade Commission and LabMD, Inc. over data security continues.

On December 22, 2015, the FTC filed its appeal brief challenging Chief Administrative Law Judge (“ALJ”) D. Michael Chappell’s November 13, 2015 decision (the “Initial Decision”) dismissing the FTC’s complaint against LabMD, a now-defunct clinical testing laboratory alleged to have compromised the personal information of its customers.  The appeal, which will be presented to the full Commission, was expected, as the FTC previously filed a Notice of Appeal shortly before Thanksgiving.

The Federal Trade Commission has decided to put off until late July a decision about whether to overturn a ruling by the agency’s chief administrative law judge in the closely watched data security action against LabMD, the Atlanta-based medical detection firm.  In a one-paragraph order issued late yesterday, the Commission extended the deadline for decision until July 28th “in order to give full consideration to the issues presented by the appeal in this proceeding.”

The Federal Trade Commission is expected to issue a ruling later this month in the LabMD case, a closely watched data security case that focuses on the scope and reach of Section 5 of the FTC Act.

The U.S. Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) has filed suit against Taiwan-based D-Link Corporation and D-Link Systems, Inc. (collectively, “D-Link”), manufacturers and sellers of home networking devices including routers, cameras, baby monitors, and video recorders.  The lawsuit claims that D-Link failed to take reasonable steps to protect its devices from known and foreseeable risks of unauthorized access.

A contentious legal battle over data security between the Federal Trade Commission and LabMD, a small medical testing lab, is chronicled in the latest edition of Bloomberg Businessweek.  Dune Lawrence’s report raises lingering questions about the FTC’s prosecution of a now-defunct company, tampered evidence and regulatory overreach.

Last month, the Federal Trade Commission’s Chief Administrative Law Judge dismissed the Commission’s long-running data security case against LabMD because it failed to prove that there was an actual or reasonably imminent threat of injury to consumers.  In the matter of LabMD, Dkt. No. 9357, Initial Decision (Nov. 13, 2015).  The issue of consumer “injury” has loomed large in the world of data privacy litigation since private plaintiffs began bringing class action lawsuits arising from data breaches.  Whether those cases are brought by individuals in their own name or on behalf of a putative class, courts have struggled with the question of what constitutes injury sufficient to successfully prosecute a claim.