Calhoun et al v. Google LLC

In August 2024, a unanimous Ninth Circuit panel reversed summary judgment for Google, holding that the district court applied the wrong standard when evaluating Google’s consent defense. The Ninth Circuit ruled that the question must be assessed from the perspective of a “reasonable user” with ordinary computer skills and sent the case back to the district court. Following the denial of class certification in June 2025, the named plaintiffs elected to proceed individually. In June 2026, the district court largely denied Google’s bid to dismiss several claims, allowing core privacy claims to continue.

Case Overview

Calhoun et al. v. Google LLC challenges Google’s alleged collection of personal information from Chrome browser users who were not synced with a Google account. According to the plaintiffs, Google promised users that Chrome would not send personal information to Google unless they affirmatively chose to sync Chrome with a Google account. Plaintiffs allege that, despite those promises, Chrome sent substantial personal information to Google even when users did not enable sync, including sensitive web browsing information and other personally identifiable information.

DiCello Levitt and co-counsel filed the lawsuit in July 2020 after an expert inspection of HTTP traffic on Chrome browsers allegedly revealed that Chrome was transmitting users’ personal information to Google regardless of whether users had chosen to sync their browsers with Google accounts. Plaintiffs claim that Google’s conduct violated the privacy promises it made specifically to Chrome users.

Google argued that its broader company-wide privacy policy permitted the challenged data collection and that the Chrome-specific privacy promises did not apply to certain data collection practices involving Google partner websites. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit rejected that approach. In an August 20, 2024, opinion written by Judge Milan D. Smith Jr., a unanimous panel held that Google’s disclosures and promises must be evaluated from the perspective of a reasonable Chrome user with ordinary computer skills—not through the highly technical framework Google advanced.

The Ninth Circuit’s decision was a significant victory for Chrome users. It reversed summary judgment for Google, revived the litigation, and confirmed that a jury must decide how a reasonable Chrome user would have understood Google’s privacy disclosures and promises.

The case remains ongoing. After the case returned to the district court, Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers denied class certification in June 2025, meaning the case is no longer proceeding as a proposed class action. The named plaintiffs—Patrick Calhoun, Elaine Crespo, Claudia Kindler, Corinice Wilson, Rodney Johnson, Michael Henry, and Nicholas Genova—then chose to continue pursuing their claims individually.

In June 2026, the district court allowed several of those individual claims to move forward. The court largely denied Google’s motion to dismiss, allowing plaintiffs’ Wiretap Act, invasion of privacy, California Comprehensive Computer Data Access and Fraud Act, and declaratory judgment claims to continue. The court dismissed plaintiffs’ quasi-contract claim and stand-alone punitive damages claim, but the core privacy claims remain active.

The firm also worked with appellate counsel Matthew Wessler of Gupta Wessler, who argued the Ninth Circuit appeal. The appeal drew amicus curiae support from a bipartisan coalition of 19 states led by Texas, the Electronic Privacy Information Center, the American Association for Justice, and the Consumer Attorneys of California. The team’s Ninth Circuit victory was recognized by Law360, which named the team among its “Legal Lions of the Week.”

The case is Patrick Calhoun et al. v. Google LLC, Case No. 4:20-cv-05146, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California. The DiCello Levitt team is led by David Straite and includes Amy Keller, Adam Prom, Corban S. Rhodes, and Julia Veeser. Co-Counsel include Bleichmar Fonti & Auld and Simmons Hanly Conroy. Gupta Wessler LLP participated in the appeal.