California Invasion of Privacy Act Cookie and Pixel Litigation

Matthew Eanet
Matthew Eanet
Eanet, PC

Matthew Eanet is the Managing Shareholder at Eanet, PC, where he manages a diverse caseload that includes complex commercial litigation matters involving real estate, employment, trade secrets, trademark and trade dress, data breach, privacy litigation, and general business disputes.

Evan Shapiro
Evan Shapiro
Tauler Smith LLP

He has extensive experience in complex civil litigation in federal, California, and New York courts. Evan has represented both plaintiffs and defendants in a wide range of areas including intellectual property, contract breaches, corporate governance, commercial torts, civil RICO, and defamation.

Live Video-Broadcast: June 18, 2026

2 hour CLE

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Program Summary

A 1967 wiretap statute drafted to stop landline eavesdropping has become the dominant private right of action against website operators in the country, and the demand letters now arrive by the thousand. Plaintiffs’ firms have weaponized Sections 631, 632.7, and 638.51 of the California Invasion of Privacy Act to target cookies, pixels, session replay tools, and chat widgets, extracting settlements at $5,000 per alleged violation, while the CCPA’s narrow private right and the federal ECPA leave gaps that CIPA fills. Any operator running Meta Pixel, Google Analytics, or vendor chat is exposed, whether or not they touch California consumers directly. The program maps the four-clause anatomy of Section 631, the pen-register theory under 638.51, the party exception and vendor-as-tool extension, the layered consent architecture that wins at the motion-to-dismiss stage, and the SB 690 reform effort and pending appellate review reshaping exposure. Attendees leave able to triage demand letters, audit banner and tag firing order, and draft consent flows that hold.

What Will You Learn

Attorneys will learn to defend CIPA Section 631, 632.7, and 638.51 cookie and pixel claims, evaluate consent architecture, and triage demand letter and class action exposure.

What Will You Gain

Competencies in layered consent design, vendor-as-tool defenses, pen-register and trap-and-trace analysis, federal ECPA and VPPA stacking, and SB 690 and appellate impact assessment.

  • CIPA framework
    Sections 631, 632.7, and 638.51 deployed against cookies, pixels, and chat tools.
  • Consent defense
    Prior, informed, unambiguous consent and layered banner architecture at motion-to-dismiss stage.
  • Section 631
    Four-clause anatomy covering interception, contents-in-transit, use-or-disclose, and aid-and-abet liability theories.
  • Pen register
    Section 638.51 device-or-process definition and the metadata-versus-contents litigation line.
  • Federal stacking
    ECPA one-party consent, crime-tort exception, and the VPPA parallel exposure front.
  • Reform tracking
    SB 690 commercial business purpose carve-out and pending appellate review of 638.51.

This course is co-sponsored with myLawCLE.

Date / Time: June 18, 2026

  • 1:00 pm – 3:10 pm Eastern
  • 12:00 pm – 2:10 pm Central
  • 11:00 am – 1:10 pm Mountain
  • 10:00 am – 12:10 pm Pacific

Closed-captioning available

Speakers

Matthew Eanet, Shareholder | Eanet, PC

Matthew Eanet is the Managing Shareholder at Eanet, PC, where he manages a diverse caseload that includes complex commercial litigation matters involving real estate, employment, trade secrets, trademark and trade dress, data breach, privacy litigation, and general business disputes. With extensive trial experience that includes tenure as a military prosecutor and significant private practice exposure with an established national firm, Matt applies a proven track record for securing successful outcomes across every phase of litigation, from pre-trial counseling to aggressive advocacy at trial. He is focused on obtaining the best outcome for his clients, whether through settlement, motion practice, or trial.

  • Education & Credentials

Matt earned his J.D. from The George Washington University School of Law, where he served as an editor on the George Washington Law Review and graduated with honors. He earned his undergraduate degree from Denison University, summa cum laude. He is admitted to the California Bar, the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, the U.S. Court of Claims, and the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.

  • Recognition & Leadership

Matt has been named a top attorney in business litigation. He was named a Rising Star by Super Lawyers (California) in 2013 and selected to Super Lawyers (California) for the years 2015 through 2020. Pasadena Magazine honored him as a Top Attorney in 2016. From 2008 to 2009, he was deployed to the Middle East in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom and was awarded the Bronze Star Medal.

  • Professional Involvement

Matt serves as an Arbitrator for the Los Angeles County Bar Association Attorney Client Fee Arbitration Service, where he has adjudicated numerous fee disputes between attorneys and their clients. He is a member of ProVisors and Vistage Worldwide. From 2001 to 2014, he served in the U.S. Army Reserves, first as a Combat Engineer and most recently as a Judge Advocate General (JAG).

  • Experience

Before forming Eanet, PC, Matt was an attorney at Reeder Lu LLP, a Los Angeles-based real estate litigation firm, and a managing partner at Eanet McCreary, LLP. He served as a Deputy City Attorney for the City of Los Angeles, where he brought over 20 trials to verdict and was selected to serve in a highly selective civil litigation program for troubled real property. He began his legal career with Manatt, Phelps and Phillips, LLP. He has prevailed on summary judgment, secured six- and seven-figure verdicts and settlements, and writes extensively on California privacy litigation, including recent commentary on CIPA trends and the Briskin v. Shopify personal jurisdiction decision.

 

Evan Shapiro, Senior Counsel | Tauler Smith LLP

He has extensive experience in complex civil litigation in federal, California, and New York courts. Evan has represented both plaintiffs and defendants in a wide range of areas including intellectual property, contract breaches, corporate governance, commercial torts, civil RICO, and defamation. He has represented clients in the entertainment, fashion, cannabis, and high technology spaces, obtaining successful outcomes, including multi-million dollar settlements. Since joining Tauler Smith in January 2025, Evan has been prosecuting data privacy claims under federal and California statutes, and California and New York common law. He has succeeded in overcoming numerous demurrers and motions to dismiss in federal and California data privacy actions.

  • Education & Credentials

Evan is a graduate of the Georgetown University Law Center and Wesleyan University (Middletown, CT). He is a member of the California and New York bars.

  • Recognition & Leadership

Evan earned his Juris Doctor cum laude from the Georgetown University Law Center and was selected to serve as a law clerk to United States District Judge Whitman Knapp of the Southern District of New York at the outset of his career.

  • Professional Involvement

Evan has decades of experience representing pro bono clients in the areas of First Amendment law, in collaboration with the ACLU, equality and LGBTQ rights, and immigration law, including deportation and asylum matters.

  • Experience

Evan started his legal career as a law clerk to a district judge in the Southern District of New York. He has worked as an associate for AmLaw 50 law firms Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP in New York and Sullivan & Cromwell LLP in Palo Alto. There, Evan represented such clients as Phillips Semiconductors, Calvin Klein, Warner Bros. Records, and ICM Partners in antitrust, contract, and products liability cases.

Agenda

SESSION 1 – Cookie Claims, Consent Defenses, and CIPA Reform | 1:00pm – 2:00pm

Maps Sections 631, 632.7, and 638.51 against current website-tracking deployments, the $5,000 damages model, the party exception and vendor-as-tool extension, layered consent architecture, banner design, opt-out propagation, pending appellate review, and the SB 690 carve-out.

BREAK | 2:00pm – 2:10pm

SESSION 2 – Section 631, 638.51, and the Plaintiff Toolkit | 2:10pm – 3:10pm

Breaks down the four-clause anatomy of Section 631, pen-register and trap-and-trace claims, TransUnion standing, personal jurisdiction, ECPA stacking, the VPPA parallel, intrusion-upon-seclusion and constitutional privacy, and the surviving plaintiff toolkit if CIPA is narrowed.

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