Hemry v. Google, LLC, 2026 WL 2909299, No. 26-cv-01611-PCP
(N.D. Cal. Sept. 28, 2026)
Hemry downloaded a fraudulent investment app, Watsans, from
the Google Play Store, Google’s main avenue for Android operating system
smartphone users to download third-party applications. He sued for violations
of the UCL
and FAL and common law negligence. Google successfully asserted §230, which
is still doing some of its core job.
Google Play’s help pages tout its safety and security and
the presence of “safe, high-quality apps,” and Hemry alleged he relied on this.
He also alleged that scam apps often make developers’ names include some
reference to “5 [stars]” so that users think that the apps themselves have
received thousands of five-star reviews from actual users, and that the Watsans
page within the Google Play Store exhibited this and other features suggestive
of a scam application that should have put Google on notice of the
application’s true nature.
The statutory claims were “at least theoretically based on a
duty that is distinct from its duties as a publisher—namely, Google’s
obligation to ensure that its own representations are not false and misleading.”
But a “general statement” of a company’s content moderation policy “is not a
specific promise, but a [mere] description of its moderation policy, and thus
protected from liability under § 230.” “Google could put apps through safety
reviews and check, scans apps to protect users from malware, forbid harmful apps,
and ask that all apps comply with all relevant laws, while still hosting
dangerous apps despite its best efforts.” The appearance of Watsans in the
Google Play store didn’t justify an inference that Google was not conducting
the promised 10,000 safety checks or requiring evidence of regulatory
compliance, as it allegedly promised to do.
The negligence claim was also barred. Hemry alleged that
Google was negligent when it undertook to review third-party apps but failed to
exercise reasonable care in performing that undertaking. “The Ninth Circuit has
repeatedly emphasized that Section 230 protects an interactive computer service
provider from liability to the extent that liability ‘would require [the
service] to actively vet and evaluate third-party’ content.” The court noted
the moderators’ dilemma: “permitting liability on such a theory could
discourage such providers from engaging in any form of content moderation—the
negative disincentive that Congress specifically sought to eliminate through
the enactment of Section 230.”
from Blogger https://tushnet.blogspot.com/2026/10/google-gets-230-protection-for.html
