govinfo:USCOURTS-cand-3_25-cv-10483-0

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 
NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA 
 
VALETTA MCENTYRE, et al., 
Plaintiffs, 
v. 
 
ALBANY MED HEALTH SYSTEMS, 
Defendant. 
 

 
 
ORDER GRANTING MOTION TO 
DISMISS 
Re: Dkt. No. 42 
 
 
Albany Med’s motion to dismiss for lack of personal jurisdiction is granted. This order 
assumes the reader’s familiarity with the facts of the case, the parties’ arguments, and the 
applicable law. 
A court can exercise specific personal jurisdiction over a defendant if: (1) the defendant 
purposefully directed activities towards the forum or purposefully availed itself of the privilege 
of conducting activities in the forum state; (2) the claim arises out of or relates to the defendant’s 
forum-related activities; and (3) the exercise of jurisdiction would be reasonable. Briskin v. 
Shopify, Inc., 135 F.4th 739, 750–51 (9th Cir. 2025) (citation modified). The first and third 
requirements are not satisfied here. 
With respect to the first requirement, the specific form of the test depends on the type of 
claim at issue. For claims sounding in tort, the Ninth Circuit applies the “purposeful direction” 

 
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test, which emphasizes where the effects of the defendant’s actions are felt. See Briskin, 135 
F.4th at 751; see also Calder v. Jones, 465 U.S. 783 (1984). For claims sounding in contract, the 
“purposeful availment” test is used. Picot v. Weston, 780 F.3d 1206, 1212 (9th Cir. 2015). This 
test focuses on whether the defendant deliberately invoked the benefits and protections of the 
forum state’s laws, such it would be fair to subject the defendant to that state’s jurisdiction. See 
id.; Schwarzenegger v. Fred Martin Motor Co., 374 F.3d 797, 802 (9th Cir. 2004). However, the 
line between the two tests is not rigid, and the first prong of the specific jurisdiction analysis may 
be satisfied by either test or “by some combination thereof.” Davis v. Cranfield Aerospace Sols., 
Ltd., 71 F.4th 1154, 1162 (9th Cir. 2023).1 
Purposeful direction requires that the defendant: (1) committed an intentional act; (2) 
aimed that act at the forum state; and (3) knew that the act would cause harm to be suffered in 
the forum state. Briskin, 135 F.4th at 751. In Briskin, these requirements were satisfied as to 
Shopify, a provider of payment processing services that deployed tracking technology to collect 
data from customers of merchants that had contracted with Shopify, including customers in 
California. See id. at 755–56. The dispute there was whether Shopify’s conduct was aimed at 
California or whether Shopify’s contact with California was “mere happenstance.” See id. at 756. 
In holding that Shopify aimed its conduct at California, the panel analogized Shopify’s contact 
with the state as being akin to the contact made by a “third party who physically entered a 
Californian’s home by deceptive means to take personal information from the Californian’s files 
for its own commercial gain.” Id. Unlike Shopify, which operated nationwide, Albany Med is a 
regional health platform that serves only upstate New York and parts of Vermont and 
 
1 The Ninth Circuit recently used the purposeful direction test in Briskin, a data privacy case with 
similar allegations as in this case. See 135 F.4th at 748–49. However, unlike the claims in 
Briskin, the claims in this case include breach of contract and negligence. See id. at 749 n.7; FAC 
(Dkt. No. 37) at 26–28. The purposeful direction test is typically not used for such claims. See 
Briskin, 135 F.4th at 751 (“Calder effects test” is used to analyze purposeful direction); Holland 
America Line Inc. v. Wartsila North America, Inc., 485 F.3d 450, 460 (9th Cir. 2007) (“[I]t is 
well established that the Calder test applies only to intentional torts, not to the breach of contract 
and negligence claims presented here.”). 

 
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Massachusetts. Although its website can be viewed nationally, the content on its website is 
oriented to its service area and its paid advertising is targeted at people who live in that area. 
Almost the entirety of Albany Med’s patient population is based in New York. In this context, 
the Briskin analogy of taking data from Californians’ homes falls apart because Albany Med is 
not focused on Californians at all. It simply happens to use an advertising and marketing service 
that is run out of California. Albany Med’s alleged conduct here is more analogous to a New 
York company using a Gmail account to commit wrongs against people in New York. A plaintiff 
could never haul that company into California court simply because Gmail runs out of 
California.2 As the plaintiffs mention fleetingly, 0.03% of Albany Med’s telehealth population 
and 0.06% of its inpatient and outpatient population lives in California. See Pl.’s Opp. (Dkt. No. 
43) at 5; Markham Decl. (Dkt. No. 42-1) ¶ 5–6. Perhaps if one of the named plaintiffs were a 
resident of California at the time of the alleged wrongdoing, and perhaps if there were plausible 
allegations that Albany Med targeted that plaintiffs specifically (or Californians generally), that 
would matter. See Walden v. Fiore, 571 U.S. 277, 285 (2014) (“It is the defendant’s conduct that 
must form the necessary connection with the forum state”). But on the fact of this case, it does 
not. 
Purposeful availment, which requires that the defendant engage in affirmative conduct to 
establish minimum contacts with the state, is also lacking here. See Picot, 780 F.3d at 1212. 
Although the mere existence of a contract in the forum state is not enough, the terms and 
contemplated consequences of the contract and the context surrounding it—such as the 
 
2 At the hearing, the plaintiffs suggested that Albany Med’s conduct goes beyond simply using a 
California-based tool to harm patients in the Northeast. Rather, the plaintiffs contend, the harm 
consists of the patients’ data being routed to a third party for monetization, and that occurs in 
California. Thus, according to the plaintiffs, a more apt analogy is that of the plaintiffs’ data 
being physically taken to California for storage and exploitation. But even under that analogy, 
harm is experienced by the people the data belongs to, not the data itself. The complaint alleges 
the following harms to the plaintiffs: (1) the deprivation of the monetary value of their data; (2) 
potential embarrassment and stigma from the interception of their private health data; and (3) 
undermining of patient trust. It is difficult to see how plaintiffs in the Northeast experience these 
harms in California, even if that is where their data is processed. Cf. Calder, 465 U.S. at 789–90 
(holding that injury in a libel case was primarily felt in the state where the plaintiff lived and 
where the magazine that published the libelous article had its largest circulation). 

 
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negotiations leading up to the contract and the parties’ course of dealing—can establish that the 
defendant actively procured the privilege of doing business in the state. See id.; Burger King 
Corp. v. Rudzewicz, 471 U.S. 462, 478–79 (1985). Thus, entering a decades-long business 
relationship with a financial advisor in the forum constitutes purposeful availment, whereas 
entering a contract of adhesion does not. See Silk v. Bond, 65 F.4th 445, 457–58 (9th Cir. 2023); 
WhatsApp Inc. v. NSO Group Technologies Ltd., 472 F. Supp. 3d 649, 675 (N.D. Cal. 2020), 
aff'd on other grounds, 17 F.4th 930 (9th Cir. 2021). The alleged facts here are closer to the latter 
situation than the former. The plaintiffs allege that, to use Google Analytics on its website, 
Albany Med had to register an account and accept Google’s terms of service, which designate 
California as the forum for disputes arising from the agreement and dictate that California law 
will govern such disputes. But nothing in the complaint suggests that Albany Med did anything 
more than accept terms it had no ability to negotiate. Again, signing up for Google Analytics 
seems more like signing up for a Gmail account than negotiating a business relationship in 
California. And even if doing so resulted in patients’ data being routed to California, the only 
reason for that is that Google happens to be based in California, not because Albany Med wanted 
the data to go to California. In other words, Albany Med’s contact with California is the kind of 
fortuitous contact that does not justify the exercise of personal jurisdiction. See Briskin, 135 
F.4th at 758; Burger King, 471 U.S. at 475. 
For similar reasons, the third requirement of the specific personal jurisdiction inquiry—
whether it would be reasonable to exercise jurisdiction—is also not satisfied here. To evaluate 
the reasonableness of exercising jurisdiction, the Ninth Circuit weighs seven factors: 
(1) the extent of the defendant’s purposeful interjection into the forum state’s affairs; (2) 
the burden on the defendant of defending in the forum; (3) the extent of conflict with the 
sovereignty of the defendant’s state; (4) the forum state’s interest in adjudicating the 
dispute; (5) the most efficient judicial resolution of the controversy; (6) the importance of 
the forum to the plaintiff’s interest in convenient and effective relief; and (7) the 
existence of an alternative forum. 
 
Briskin, 135 F.4th at 761. 

 
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Not only is there an alternative forum for this dispute, but a far more appropriate one at 
that. This case is brought by two New York plaintiffs against a New York defendant for claims 
under New York and federal law. The overwhelming majority of the proposed class is comprised 
of New York residents. New York has a far more concrete interest in protecting the privacy 
interests of its residents and ensuring that its unfair competition law is followed than California 
does in what the plaintiffs characterize as “the interception and misuse of . . . data through 
systems operating within its borders.” Pl.’s Opp. at 8. In fact, given that healthcare is a core 
police power of states, there are few disputes New York would have a stronger interest in than 
one between New York citizens and a New York-based health provider. And after Google’s 
dismissal, this case is no longer related to Doe I v. Google (Case No. 23-cv-2431). See Dkt. No. 
41. Thus, there is no shared discovery or streamlining that would result in this dispute being 
adjudicated more efficiently in this district as opposed to in New York. Finally, although Albany 
Med agreed to litigate disputes relating to its use of Google Analytics in California under 
California law, the burden of litigating disputes with a single California-based entity is 
considerably different from that of being subjected to a class action in California by a patient 
base that is almost entirely situated in New York. It is not clear that Albany Med could have 
reasonably anticipated that outcome from its agreement to Google’s default terms of service. So 
even if purposeful direction or purposeful availment were satisfied here, the exercise of 
jurisdiction would not be reasonable. 
IT IS SO ORDERED. 
Dated: June 9, 2026 
______________________________________ 
VINCE CHHABRIA 
United States District Judge 
 

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