Key Cases
Sixth Circuit: Salazar v. Paramount Global (133 F.4th 642, 6th Cir. 2025)
The court held: Salazar is NOT a VPPA "consumer" because he subscribed to a newsletter, not to video.
Key language from Judge Nalbandian: "A person is a 'consumer' only when he subscribes to 'goods or services' in the nature of 'video cassette tapes or similar audio visual materials.'"
The court emphasized that "goods or services" must be read as "video-related goods or services."
D.C. Circuit: Pileggi v. Washington Post (89 F.4th 661, D.C. Cir. 2024)
The court held that simply reading articles on a news site does not make you a VPPA "consumer," even if the site contains embedded video.
To be a "consumer," you must actually consume the video offering.
Impact on Defendants
Under the narrow reading, defendants have:
- Smaller class sizes (only actual video consumers qualify)
- Easier dismissal (plaintiffs must prove consumer status)
- Lower damages exposure
- Better settlement leverage
Example:
- 50,000 actual video watchers (out of 1M visitors) = $5M-$125M exposure
- Settlement range: $2M-$20M
The infrastructure answer
The free PieEye compliance scan identifies whether your website has the VPPA vulnerabilities that plaintiffs' attorneys look for — tracking pixels firing on video pages without consent, data flowing to third parties before users have agreed, and policy-to-practice mismatches.
For the complete VPPA compliance framework, see our VPPA compliance guide. For the circuit split and forum shopping implications, see VPPA circuit split and forum shopping. For the Supreme Court case that will resolve this split, see Salazar v. Paramount Global.
Run a free PieEye compliance scan — it takes minutes, requires no code changes to initiate, and tells you exactly what a plaintiffs' attorney's scanning tool would find if it looked at your website today.