UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT BRANDON BRISKIN, on behalf of No. 22-15815 himself and those similarly situated, D.C. No. 4:21-cv- Plaintiff-Appellant, 06269-PJH

v. OPINION SHOPIFY, INC.; SHOPIFY (USA), INC.; SHOPIFY PAYMENTS (USA), INC.,

Defendants-Appellees.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of California Phyllis J. Hamilton, District Judge, Presiding

Argued and Submitted August 16, 2023 San Francisco, California

Filed November 28, 2023

Before: Consuelo M. Callahan, Bridget S. Bade, and Daniel A. Bress, Circuit Judges.

Opinion by Judge Bress 2 BRISKIN V. SHOPIFY, INC.

SUMMARY *

Specific Jurisdiction

The panel affirmed the district court’s dismissal, due to lack of specific personal jurisdiction over the defendants, of a putative class action alleging that Shopify, Inc. violated various California privacy and unfair competition laws because it deliberately concealed its involvement in certain consumer transactions. Defendants offer a web-based payment processing platform to merchants nationwide. When processing payments, defendants obtain the personal information of those merchants’ customers. For specific jurisdiction to exist over Shopify, plaintiff’s claim must arise out of or relate to Shopify’s forum-related activities. The panel held that there was no causal relationship between Shopify’s broader business contacts in California and plaintiff’s claims because these contacts did not cause plaintiff’s harm. Nor did plaintiff’s claims “relate to” Shopify’s broader business activities in California outside of its extraction and retention of plaintiff’s data. Because there was an insufficient relationship between plaintiff's claims and Shopify’s broader business contacts in California, the activities relevant to the specific jurisdiction analysis were those that caused plaintiff’s injuries: Shopify’s collection, retention, and use of consumer data obtained

* This summary constitutes no part of the opinion of the court. It has been prepared by court staff for the convenience of the reader. BRISKIN V. SHOPIFY, INC. 3

from persons who made online purchases while in California. The panel held that Shopify, which provides nationwide web-based payment processing services to online merchants, did not expressly aim its conduct toward California. The panel held that plaintiff’s California connection—plaintiff resides in California and was physically located in California when he used Shopify’s e-commerce payment system—did not matter to the analysis of whether Shopify expressly aimed its activities toward California. When analyzing whether a court has personal jurisdiction over a web-based payment processor in a suit alleging the unlawful extraction, retention, and sharing of consumer data, the legal framework and principles that should be brought to bear are those found in the court’s personal jurisdiction cases involving interactive websites. Applying those principles to this case, the panel held that Shopify did not expressly aim its suit- related conduct toward California. The panel held that the district court’s effective denial of plaintiff’s request for jurisdictional discovery of Shopify was not an abuse of discretion.

COUNSEL Nicolas A. Sansone (argued), Allison M. Zieve, and Scott L. Nelson, Public Citizen Litigation Group, Washington, D.C.; Seth A. Safier, Matthew T. McCrary, and Todd Kennedy, Gutride Safier LLP, San Francisco, California; for Plaintiff- Appellant. Moez Kaba (argued), Hueston Hennigan LLP, Los Angeles, California; Sourabh Mishra, Hueston Hennigan LL