In an effort to overcome hurdles to Article III standing, many website wiretapping suits today accuse businesses of unlawfully sharing sensitive health or financial data with third parties.  However, Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 11(b) requires plaintiffs’ lawyers to ensure that these “factual contentions” in a complaint “have evidentiary support.”  A California federal judge gave teeth to this requirement in a recent sanctions order, admonishing the plaintiff’s lawyers for “advancing unfounded and irrelevant allegations” about a business’s sharing of “health information.”  Mitchener v. Talkspace Network LLC, No. 2:24-CV-07067-JAK (BFMX), 2026 WL 84466, at *3-4 (C.D. Cal. Jan. 7, 2026).

The plaintiff claimed to be a user of talkspace.com and brought a putative class action against Talkspace, a company offering therapy services through the website.  The plaintiff asserted in a complaint—signed by her lawyers—that Talkspace used a website pixel tool to share “name,” “date of birth,” “address,” and “medical information related to minors” with a third party, without user consent.  The plaintiff claimed this violated the “trap and trace” provision of the California Invasion of Privacy Act.

Talkspace then filed a declaration from an expert showing the website did not transmit names, dates of birth, addresses, or medical information, as the Plaintiff had alleged.  Talkspace moved for sanctions against the plaintiff’s lawyers under Rule 11, which requires that “factual contentions” in a complaint “have evidentiary support.”

The court agreed that the plaintiff’s lawyers violated Rule 11, holding they “failed to provide ‘factual foundation’ to support the[ir] allegations.”  The court noted the plaintiff “has not provided any evidence or explanation of any investigation that occurred prior to filing the [complaint].”  Although the plaintiff had voluntarily dismissed her claims by that point, the court issued an order formally admonishing the plaintiff’s lawyers for advancing the unfounded allegations.  As the court observed, the plaintiff’s lawyers’ conduct “could cause Defendant reputational and economic harm” and “was improper, unprofessional, and contrary to the California Rules of Professional Conduct and Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.”

This sanctions order shows the importance of conducting an early fact investigation into plaintiffs’ allegations of data sharing at the outset of litigation.  Depending on the results of that investigation, plaintiffs’ lawyers may be persuaded to dismiss or narrow their claims.  As the Mitchener case demonstrates, sanctions also may be appropriate.