William Dotinga reports:
Google asked a federal judge Wednesday for permission to take questions about federal wiretapping laws to the 9th Circuit before a Gmail class action advances any further.
[…]
[Judge Lucy] Koh [had] declined to dismiss the majority of the sprawling class action, finding that Gmail’s interceptions fall outside the narrow “ordinary course of business” exception carved out of the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, known as ECPA. She also noted that Google’s policies do not extract explicit consent from users, another exception to ECPA on which the company relied.
In a filing late Wednesday, Google said it wants questions about those ECPA exceptions sent to the 9th Circuit for review before litigation goes forward.
“The court’s ruling on its construction of the ‘ordinary course of business’ exception involves a controlling question of law on which there is substantial ground for difference of opinion, and as to which an immediate appeal may materially advance the ultimate termination of the litigation,” Google said in its filing.
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