The Department of Education today approved roughly $6 billion in student loan relief for more than 300,000 students who attended The Art Institutes, a network of for-profit colleges that was plagued by fraud allegations before completely shutting down in September 2023. The chain’s parent company, Education Management Corporation, reached a nearly $100 million settlement with the Justice Department in 2015 after a series of lawsuits and lost its accreditation years ago. USA Today has the story, here. The post Dep’t of Ed approves $6 billion in student loan relief for students of college shut d ..read more

The Environmental Protection Agency has finalized a ban on consumer uses of  methylene chloride, a chemical that is widely used as a paint stripper but is known to cause liver cancer and other health problems. The EPA said its action will protect Americans from health risks while allowing certain commercial uses to continue with robust worker protections. AP has the story, here. The post EPA bans consumer use of a toxic chemical used as a paint stripper appeared first on CLP Blog ..read more

This looks like important research bearing on the issue of junk fees, among other things. From the Bureau’s newsroom: Today, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) issued a new report that suggests consumers tend to pay more for products that have more complex pricing structures. The report is based on experiments with multiple rounds of buyers and sellers interacting in simple markets, and found that participants tended to pay more when prices were broken into sub-parts and were harder to understand. The research has implications for understanding how junk fees impede fair and compet ..read more

The Federal Communications Commission announced yesterday that it fined the nation’s largest wireless carriers for illegally sharing access to customers’ location information without consent and without taking reasonable measures to protect that information against unauthorized disclosure. Sprint and T-Mobile – which have merged since the investigation began – face fines of more than $12 million and $80 million, respectively.  AT&T is fined more than $57 million, and Verizon is fined almost $47 million. Details are here. The post FCC fines the wireless carriers for illegally sharing c ..read more

It’s been years since I have had to litigate the issue of whether the inclusion of a trademark in the domain name for a web site about the trademark holder has Lanham Act ramifications. I rather thought that issue was settled by such cases as Lamparello and Bosley. The final nail in the coffin was the defeat of Wal-Mart in Smith v. Wal-Mart.  But lo and behold, I got request out of the blue for help protecting the website WalMart Is the Devil posted by a dissatisfied former employee, against a claim of trademark infringement, contending that Wal-Mart’s customers might imagine that they co ..read more

The Federal Trade Commission just updated its Health Breach Notification Rule to revise definitions and clarify its coverage to include developers of health mobile apps and other technology. The rule, which requires vendors to notify affected consumers and the FTC following a data breach affecting personal health records, also requires additional information in notices to consumers, including names or descriptions of third parties that obtained their “unsecured” identifiable health data. Among other revisions, the new rule clarifies that the term “breach of security,” which triggers notificati ..read more

In 2021, New York enacted the Affordable Broadband Act (ABA), which requires internet service providers to offer broadband internet to low-income New Yorkers at reduced prices. Providers sued, arguing that the law was both field preempted by the Communications Act of 1934 (as amended by the Telecommunications Act of 1996), and conflict preempted by the FCC’s 2018 order classifying broadband as an information service (and repealing net neutrality rules). The district court had issued a preliminary injunction against the ABA, and later entered a stipulated judgment. Today, the Second Circuit vac ..read more

Today, the Department of Transportation published on its website a final rule regarding airline refunds, requiring (1) automatic (cash) refunds when flights are cancelled or significantly changed and customers do not accept alternatives offered, (2) refunds of checked bag fees for significantly delayed bags, (3) refunds for ancillary services fees (seating, etc.) that are paid for and not provided; and (4) requiring carriers to provide credits or vouchers valid for 5 years where passengers with nonrefundable tickets cannot travel due to a serious communicable disease. DOT’s press release on th ..read more

Neil L. Sobol of Texas A&M has written Consumer Law for Gen Z Law Students, 66 Arizona Law Review (2024). Here’s the abstract: Whether they are consumers, representing consumers, or advising clients dealing with consumers, law school graduates will inevitably confront numerous consumer law issues. Moreover, most students entering law school are members of Generation Z and face a new wave of consumer laws arising from the 2007–2009 recession and the rapid growth of new technologies. Clickwrap agreements, email spoofing, cybercrimes, cryptocurrencies, fintech, identity theft, onli ..read more

Tamar Meshel and Moin A. Yahya both of the University of Alberta – Faculty of Law, have written The Gatekeepers of the Federal Arbitration Act: An Empirical Analysis of the FAA in the ‎Lower Courts, forthcoming in the Mississippi Law Journal.  Here’s the abstract: This article presents the results of the first comprehensive empirical study of motions to ‎compel arbitration under the Federal Arbitration Act (FAA). Arbitration has become a divisive ‎issue both in the United States Supreme Court and in American society, fueling calls to restrict or ‎entirely ban its use in certain ..read more