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Executive Summary

The Third Circuit affirmed the District Court's dismissal and summary judgment in favor of Amazon Web Services in a putative class action under the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA). The appellate court held that BIPA's financial-institution exemption applies to Pindrop Security, that the extraterritoriality doctrine bars claims against Amazon because all relevant conduct occurred outside Illinois, and that the District Court did not abuse its discretion on discovery and procedural motions. This ruling definitively eliminates a material class-action exposure for Amazon Web Services.

Court Ruling Details

Key Facts

• Third Circuit affirmed summary judgment for Amazon Web Services on all BIPA claims, holding that the extraterritoriality doctrine bars application of Illinois law because Amazon's servers are in Virginia and no relevant conduct occurred in Illinois.
• The court also affirmed dismissal of Pindrop Security under BIPA's financial-institution exemption, finding that Pindrop's authentication services for financial transactions qualify as 'financial activities' under GLBA.
• District Court's denial of plaintiffs' discovery extensions and voluntary dismissal motions was upheld as within its discretion.
• This ruling joins the Seventh and Ninth Circuits in holding that BIPA only applies to conduct 'occurring primarily and substantially in Illinois.'
• The case had been ongoing for over 4 years, with Amazon producing 36,000 pages of discovery, and the appellate decision is final and not subject to further appeal.

Financial Impact

Eliminates potential class-action exposure under BIPA for Amazon Web Services' voiceprint authentication services. BIPA provides for statutory damages of $1,000-$5,000 per violation, and a class of Illinois callers could have represented hundreds of thousands of individuals, creating potential exposure in the hundreds of millions to low billions of dollars.

Risk Factors

• Plaintiffs could petition for certiorari to the Supreme Court, though the Third Circuit's alignment with the Seventh and Ninth Circuits makes this unlikely.
• Other BIPA cases against Amazon or AWS involving different factual scenarios (e.g., data stored in Illinois) could still proceed.
• The ruling does not address potential BIPA claims under other state biometric privacy laws.

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