• by Wendy Davis  @wendyndavis, January 11, 2024

Siding with Google, a federal appeals court on Thursday dismissed a lawsuit by Best Carpet Values over how its website was displayed in the Android search app results.

The ruling, issued by a three-judge panel of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, centered on a Google-branded footer that appeared at the bottoms of screens in the Android search app and obscured a small portion of the webpage.

When users clicked on that footer, a separate overlay of banner ads for a Best Carpet competitor allegedly appeared. The footer was in use between 2018 and 2002 according to court documents.

Among other claims, Best Carpet's 2020 class-action complaint alleged that Google engaged in “trespass to chattels” -- meaning that Google allegedly infringed Best Carpet's property rights -- due to the footer.

The company contended that Google “abused its dominance of the internet search, internet advertising, and smartphone operating software markets to place advertising for itself, its clients and others on millions of businesses’ proprietary websites without those businesses’ consent and without paying for the ad space.”

In 2021, U.S. District Court Judge Edward Davila in the Northern District of California rejected Google's bid to dismiss the case at an early stage.

Google appealed that decision to the 9th Circuit, which reversed Davila's ruling on Thursday.

Circuit Judge J. Clifford Wallace wrote that Best Carpet lacked the kind of "cognizable property interest" in website copies that would warrant a "trespass to chattels" claim. Wallace's opinion was joined by Circuit Judges Sidney Thomas, and Danielle Forrest.

Google had argued to the panel that a contrary ruling would pave the way for an influx of lawsuits against browser and software developers.

“A website owner could assert that interest to bar any application that changed the way their website appeared, even if it merely allowed a user to increase the size of text, translate it, or screen images for children,” Google wrote in its appeal.

The company also notes that Stanford law professor Mark Lemley and Santa Clara University law professor Eric Goldman both criticized Davila's original ruling.

“The nutty Internet 'trespass to chattels' theory is back,” Lemley said in a post on X (formerly Twitter). “Just wait until the court finds out about the 'resize windows' button.”

Goldman had characterized Davila's decision as “obviously wrong” and “wholly counterintuitive,” in a blog post.