USC Arcadia Hospital Pixel Tracking Class Action Settlement

Pixel Tracking · Claims Open

Current Status

Claims are open. The claim deadline is December 7, 2026; claim forms must be submitted on the settlement website or postmarked by that date, and the settlement sources give no time of day. The Los Angeles County Superior Court granted preliminary approval on September 8, 2026, and the final approval hearing is set for December 14, 2026. The court has not yet decided whether to give final approval, and no payment date had been announced as of October 24, 2026.

What Changed Recently?

USC Arcadia Hospital agreed to pay $200,000 to resolve a proposed class action over tracking technology on its public website, and the court’s preliminary approval on September 8, 2026 opened the claim process. The order appointed Simpluris as settlement administrator and set December 7, 2026 as the deadline to file a claim, opt out or object.

The case, Merle v. USC Arcadia Hospital, was filed on January 30, 2023 in Los Angeles County Superior Court. The lawsuit claims the hospital installed the Meta Pixel and other tracking tools on its website and, through them, shared website users’ private information with Meta and other third parties, violating their privacy. The settlement releases claims under California’s Confidentiality of Medical Information Act (Civil Code § 56) and the California Invasion of Privacy Act (Penal Code §§ 631 and 637), among others. USC Arcadia Hospital denies the claims and all wrongdoing and liability, including that it violated HIPAA or any similar privacy statute, and says it believes it complied with them.

Who Qualifies?

The settlement class is any person who completed a form on USC Arcadia Hospital’s website to sign up for email or event updates from February 1, 2022 to January 31, 2023. The settlement agreement defines the hospital’s website to include uscarcadiahospital.org, methodisthospital.org and other websites or patient portals the hospital used or controlled during that period. It estimates the class at about 582 people.

The class is not every visitor to the website. It is tied to one activity, completing a sign-up form for email or event updates, and the class list came from the hospital’s own records. According to the settlement website, people who received a notice are identified in those records as class members.

Excluded are the judges presiding over the case and their families; USC Arcadia Hospital, its subsidiaries, parent companies, successors and predecessors, any entity in which it or its parents have a controlling interest, and its current or former officers and directors; anyone who submits a valid request for exclusion; and the successors or assigns of excluded people.

How Much Can Class Members Get?

The settlement provides two benefits. Every class member who does not opt out receives a one-year subscription to CyEx Privacy Shield Pro, a privacy service that the settlement agreement says includes a VPN, data broker opt-out, dark web monitoring and a password manager. Class members who file a valid claim also receive an equal share of the net settlement fund in cash.

The $200,000 fund pays several costs first. Class counsel is asking the court for $61,335.92 in attorneys’ fees and $15,992.25 in expenses, plus a $1,500 service award to the named plaintiff. The settlement agreement puts administration costs at $17,766, which includes $2,470 to provide the CyEx codes to the whole class. If the court approves those amounts, about $103,406 would remain to divide equally among approved claims.