Supreme Court rejects Verizon bid for $47 million refund of FCC fine

The Supreme Court has denied Verizon's request for a $47 million refund of a fine imposed by the Federal Communications Commission. Verizon's petition was rejected without explanation, effectively closing off any avenue for the company to seek a review of the fine by a lower court or to compel the FCC to issue a refund. Despite this setback, AT&T and T-Mobile are still contesting similar fines, arguing that selling device-location data does not breach US telecom law.

The three carriers collectively faced a $196 million fine in 2024 for selling mobile users' real-time location data without their consent, obtained from data aggregators who in turn resold it to other firms. The carriers incurred the fines and contested them in courts, asserting that their Seventh Amendment right to a jury trial had been infringed.

Multiple challenges by AT&T and Verizon were consolidated into a single case, with the Supreme Court ruling against the carriers in June. The court's decision, delivered in an 8-1 verdict with Justice Clarence Thomas casting the sole dissent, affirmed that the FCC's penalty process did not contravene the Seventh Amendment because the carriers could have sought jury trials if they had chosen to defy the fines and await government collection attempts.