California

State of play.

• California's privacy enforcement front is expanding on two tracks simultaneously. The California Privacy Protection Agency has opened a rulemaking on employee data handling under the CCPA, while over 4,000 CIPA lawsuits targeting website tracking technologies remain unresolved pending appellate guidance (→ CalPrivacy Seeks Comments on CCPA Employee Data Notices by May 20, ACC Urges CA Appeals Court to Rule CIPA Doesn't Cover Website Cookies, Pixels).
• Right of publicity and image rights litigation is escalating in California federal court. Dua Lipa's $15 million suit against Samsung — alleging copyright infringement, right of publicity violations, and Lanham Act false endorsement over a manipulated backstage photograph used on consumer product packaging — signals that high-profile figures are pursuing aggressive litigation over unauthorized commercial image use, with Samsung's defense strategy and consent/licensing arguments still unknown (→ Dua Lipa sues Samsung for $15M over unauthorized TV ad image use).
• California federal courts are generating consequential doctrine across AI, employment, and consumer law. The Musk v. OpenAI trial is testing nonprofit-to-profit conversion doctrine; Mobley v. Workday has a certified ADEA class on AI hiring tool disparate impact; and Anthropic's transformative fair use argument for Claude training data is pending in San Francisco (→ Musk-Altman OpenAI trial opens with statements in Oakland court, Ex-Workday Attorney Drops Remainder of 2023 Bias Suit After Settlement Talks, Anthropic argues Claude's copyright use is transformative fair use in CA court).
• The Federal Circuit has reinforced the patent-trade secret boundary under California's UTSA, holding that patent disclosures irrevocably foreclose trade secret claims on the same subject matter — a critical constraint for medtech and patent-heavy industries pursuing dual-protection strategies (→ Federal Circuit Rules Patent Disclosures Bar Trade Secret Claims in Elist Penuma Case).
• For counsel advising employers, technology companies, entertainment IP clients, or healthcare operators with California operations, the practical baseline is a multi-front compliance environment: CCPA employee data rulemaking, CIPA litigation exposure, right of publicity and Lanham Act enforcement, CPOM enforcement against PE-backed MSO structures, and AI copyright doctrine are all simultaneously active.

Where things stand.

• CCPA employee data protections are in active rulemaking. The California Privacy Protection Agency has solicited public comments on potential updates to employee privacy notice requirements; the employment exemption expired January 1, 2023, and a 2023 AG enforcement sweep established baseline compliance expectations (→ CalPrivacy Seeks Comments on CCPA Employee Data Notices by May 20).
• CIPA digital wiretapping litigation has reached a structural inflection point. More than 4,000 lawsuits and arbitrations target website tracking technologies; federal courts are split on whether CIPA's pen register framework applies; the California Court of Appeal's forthcoming ruling in the Variety Media case will determine whether CIPA or the CCPA framework governs — a binary outcome with major exposure implications for any company running standard web analytics (→ ACC Urges CA Appeals Court to Rule CIPA Doesn't Cover Website Cookies, Pixels).
• Standing doctrine is narrowing privacy plaintiffs' options in federal court. The Central District dismissed all eight counts in a privacy suit against Paramount Skydance under the TransUnion standard, requiring injury closely tied to historically recognized harms; statutory violations and speculative future harm are no longer sufficient (→ Federal Court Dismisses Paramount Privacy Lawsuit Over Concrete Injury Standard).
• Right of publicity and false endorsement claims are an active litigation category in California. The Dua Lipa v. Samsung complaint layers copyright ownership, California right of publicity, and Lanham Act false endorsement over a single manipulated backstage photograph used on consumer product packaging — a fact pattern that tests consent, licensing chain, and damages allocation across multiple theories simultaneously (→ Dua Lipa sues Samsung for $15M over unauthorized TV ad image use).
• The AG's CPOM enforcement posture has hardened. AG Bonta's unsolicited amicus brief in Art Center Holdings argues that MSO succession agreements granting unilateral physician-replacement rights violate CPOM even when unexercised; expanded injunctive enforcement authority against PE-backed platforms remains active .
• The Federal Circuit has reinforced the patent-trade secret boundary under California's UTSA. Patent disclosures irrevocably place information in the public domain, foreclosing trade secret claims on the same subject matter; a fourth alleged secret — a surgical instrument list sent by email without confidentiality markings — also failed for insufficient secrecy measures (→ Federal Circuit Rules Patent Disclosures Bar Trade Secret Claims in Elist Penuma Case).
• The Ninth Circuit's reasonable consumer standard is being refined in both directions. The court revived a Target thread-count class action by holding defendants must establish genuine label ambiguity before invoking an impossibility defense, while affirming dismissal of a Brita filter suit where price point, qualified language, and QR-code disclosures defeated a misleading-omission theory (→ Ninth Circuit Revives Target Thread Count Class Action[1][7], Ninth Circuit Affirms Dismissal of Brita Filter Class Action on April 16, 2026[1][2][6]).
• AI copyright doctrine is being shaped in California federal courts. Anthropic's transformative fair use argument for Claude training data is pending; the Bartz v. Anthropic $1.5 billion settlement with over 100,000 authors and rights holders has a fairness hearing scheduled in San Francisco federal court (→ Anthropic argues Claude's copyright use is transformative fair use in CA court).
• AI hiring tool vendor liability is in active litigation. Mobley v. Workday has a certified ADEA class with viable disparate impact claims against the tool vendor; the unresolved question is how indemnification provisions in vendor contracts allocate exposure between platform developers and deploying employers (→ Ex-Workday Attorney Drops Remainder of 2023 Bias Suit After Settlement Talks).
• California's absolute noncompete ban applies extraterritorially. Business and Professional Code § 16600.5 voids noncompetes regardless of where signed or which state's law the agreement selects; choice-of-law provisions have not reliably resolved the conflict in litigation .
• SB 553 workplace violence prevention enforcement is entering its active phase. The two-year anniversary of the law's effective date arrives July 2026; mandatory annual retraining and plan reviews are now required, and Cal/OSHA inspections are increasingly likely .

Latest developments.

• Dua Lipa files $15 million federal suit against Samsung in California, alleging copyright infringement, right of publicity violations, and Lanham Act false endorsement over a manipulated backstage photograph used on television packaging and global marketing materials without consent; Samsung has not responded and allegedly ignored a prior cease-and-desist (→ Dua Lipa sues Samsung for $15M over unauthorized TV ad image use).

Active questions and open splits.

• CIPA scope: pen register statute or CCPA compliance pathway? The California Court of Appeal's ruling in Variety Media will resolve whether cookies and tracking pixels trigger CIPA's warrant requirement or fall under the CCPA's clearer compliance framework — a binary outcome affecting every company with a California-facing website (→ ACC Urges CA Appeals Court to Rule CIPA Doesn't Cover Website Cookies, Pixels).
• Right of publicity and Lanham Act false endorsement: consent, licensing chain, and damages allocation. The Dua Lipa v. Samsung case will test how courts apportion liability when a manipulated celebrity image travels through product packaging and global distribution — specifically whether Samsung can invoke third-party licensing, fair use, or other defenses, and how profits-based and statutory damages interact across the stacked theories (→ Dua Lipa sues Samsung for $15M over unauthorized TV ad image use).
• CPOM enforcement: categorical ban on succession rights vs. fact-specific control analysis. AG Bonta's position in Art Center Holdings — that any unexercised MSO replacement right violates CPOM — conflicts with calls for an actual-control analysis; the Court of Appeal's resolution will determine whether existing MSO agreements across California require immediate restructuring .
• Nonprofit-to-profit conversion doctrine. The Musk v. OpenAI trial is the first major test of whether founding agreements in nonprofit AI organizations are enforceable and what remedies attach to conversion — with implications for any mission-driven entity that has restructured for commercial investment (→ Musk-Altman OpenAI trial opens with statements in Oakland court).
• AI training data fair use doctrine. Anthropic's transformative fair use argument in California federal court, alongside the Bartz settlement, will shape whether large-scale ingestion of copyrighted works for model training is defensible without licensing — a question with industry-wide implications regardless of which company prevails (→ Anthropic argues Claude's copyright use is transformative fair use in CA court).
• Patent-trade secret dual-protection viability. The Federal Circuit's ruling in International Medical Devices v. Cornell forecloses trade secret claims on patent-disclosed subject matter under California's UTSA, but the precise audit framework firms should use to identify dual-protection vulnerabilities in existing portfolios remains to be worked out (→ Federal Circuit Rules Patent Disclosures Bar Trade Secret Claims in Elist Penuma Case).
• AI hiring tool liability: vendor vs. employer exposure allocation. Mobley v. Workday has a certified ADEA class with viable disparate impact claims against the tool vendor; how indemnification provisions in vendor contracts allocate exposure between platform developers and deploying employers is unresolved (→ Ex-Workday Attorney Drops Remainder of 2023 Bias Suit After Settlement Talks).

What to watch.

• Samsung's response to the Dua Lipa complaint — its consent, licensing chain, and fair use arguments will define the battleground for right of publicity and Lanham Act false endorsement claims in California consumer product contexts (→ Dua Lipa sues Samsung for $15M over unauthorized TV ad image use).
• Musk v. OpenAI remedies phase — the advisory jury's liability findings and the court's remedial orders will determine whether nonprofit-to-profit conversion creates enforceable obligations and what structural relief is available (→ Musk-Altman OpenAI trial opens with statements in Oakland court).
• Bartz v. Anthropic fairness hearing in San Francisco federal court — approval or rejection will set the damages benchmark for AI copyright disputes and signal how courts will treat training data acquisition going forward (→ Anthropic argues Claude's copyright use is transformative fair use in CA court).
• CalPrivacy Agency action following the CCPA employee data rulemaking comment period — the agency's subsequent guidance will define revised notice and disclosure standards for all covered California employers (→ CalPrivacy Seeks Comments on CCPA Employee Data Notices by May 20).
• California Court of Appeal ruling in Variety Media CIPA case — outcome determines whether businesses face CIPA's warrant-requirement exposure or the CCPA compliance pathway for standard web analytics, with immediate implications for the 4,000+ pending suits (→ ACC Urges CA Appeals Court to Rule CIPA Doesn't Cover Website Cookies, Pixels).
• California Court of Appeal decision in Art Center Holdings — the ruling on MSO succession agreements will either validate or require restructuring of PE-backed physician practice platforms statewide .