In Sambreel Holdings LLC et al. v. Facebook Inc., Southern District of California Judge Cathy Ann Bencivengo dismissed without prejudice a case brought by Sambreel Holdings LLC, online advertising display company, accusing Facebook of anticompetitively stealing ad business. The plaintiff helps businesses design a Facebook presense that incorporates the clients’ own website images. The complaint alleged that Facebook responded to this competition by steering advertisers away from Sambreel in part by organizing a boycott and threatening not to deal with any company working with Sambreel. The plaintiff claims to have lost 80% of its revenue as a result of Facebook’s conduct.
Additionally, Sambreel claimed that Facebook scanned the browsers of users who logged on to Facebook to determine whether they had downloaded PageRage without the users’ permission. Facebook then required users who had downloaded PageRage to remove the entire platform from their computers and disable all Sambreel products — not just PageRage — before they were allowed to access the site, the suit says.
The court found that Facebook was merely defending against an illegitimate invasion of its business and held that it had no duty to enable companies like Sambreel to use its social-networking platform.