AT&T and Verizon lose Supreme Court case over fines for selling location data

At oral argumentsThe judges questioned the claims of AT&T and Verizon and appeared to agree that the FCC’s favorable rulings are not binding until they are followed in court. Justice Brett Kavanaugh described the case as a victory for the carriers in any way, because the government admitted that its laws are not enforced without trial.

“It looks like you’ve won a legal victory going forward, in a way,” Kavanaugh told a lawyer representing the carriers.

Carriers “tried to avoid any response”

Today’s decision is important to ensure that the FCC has the power to investigate and issue penalties that can be enforced in court, said John Bergmayer, director of legal affairs at the advocacy group Public Knowledge.

“The Supreme Court found this,” Bergmayer said in a Press release. “AT&T and Verizon sold access to their customers’ data, then failed to stop bounty hunters and rogue sheriffs from using it to track people who didn’t know they were being tracked.” The FCC investigated, found the carriers guilty, and issued penalties that the carriers were free to challenge in court.

AT&T and Verizon “tried to avoid all accountability by claiming that the FCC’s system was against them,” but the Supreme Court has proven that not to be true, Bergmayer said. “This decision makes it possible for the FCC to carry out the work that Congress has given it.” An agency that cannot investigate carriers and assumes that sanctions will lose its best tools for consumer protection and enforcement,” he said.

Regarding Kavanaugh’s point in oral arguments, Bergmayer told Ars today that “you can argue against this arrangement, but that was already the law. The FCC would have lost if it had argued otherwise, he said.”