$850K Scientific American Settlement Ends Class Action Lawsuit Over Alleged Data Sharing with Meta
by Chloe Gocher
Lee v. Springer Nature America, Inc.
Filed: July 12, 2024 ◆§ 1:24-cv-04493
An $850K settlement ends a class action lawsuit against Scientific American's parent company Springer Nature over allegedly non-consensual data sharing.
New York
An $850,000 class action settlement will end litigation that alleged the company behind ScientificAmerican.com illegally collected and distributed user data to Meta without consent.
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The Scientific American class action settlement with Springer Nature America, Inc. received preliminary court approval on July 10, 2025 and covers anyone who, from June 12, 2022 through July 31, 2025, had login credentials for ScientificAmerican.com, had a Facebook account, and requested or obtained video content from and/or through the website while logged into Facebook.
The court-approved website for the Scientific American settlement can be found at SpringerNatureVPPASettlement.com.
Springer Nature settlement class members who submit a timely, valid claim form will be able to receive a pro-rata, or equal-share, portion of the $850,000 settlement fund after the payment of legal fees and lead plaintiff awards.
To file a claim form online, class members must visit this page of the settlement website and log in with the unique notice ID and PIN found in their copy of the settlement notice.
Alternatively, a PDF of the claim form is available to print, fill out and mail back to the address listed on the first page of the form.
All claim forms must be submitted online or postmarked by September 14, 2025.
The amount of each individual payment from the class action settlement will depend on the total number of valid claims that are filed, the website states.
Additionally, as part of the class action settlement, Springer Nature has agreed to suspend its use of Meta’s data tracking tools and other tracking technologies on Scientific American website pages that include video content and have a URL that identifies the video content viewed.
A hearing is set for October 15, 2025 to determine whether the settlement will receive final approval from the court. Payments will begin to be distributed to class members only after final approval has been granted and any appeals have been resolved.
The Springer Nature America class action lawsuit claimed that the company used the Meta Pixel—a piece of back-end code—in the video content on ScientificAmerican.com to collect users’ personally identifiable information and send it to Meta without consent, in violation of the federal Video Privacy Protection Act.
Did you know that some class action settlements require no proof to submit a claim? Check out the latest class action settlements.
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