Prosecuting Surveillance-Pricing Class Actions: First-Wave Complaints and the First Private Right of Action

Blake Hunter Yagman, Founding Partner | Yagman PLLC

Blake Hunter Yagman is the Founding Partner of Yagman PLLC. He represents the first ever class of consumers victimized by surveillance pricing, in which airfares were adjusted according to sensitive information collected about each of them. His practice centers on leveling the playing field for consumers, small businesses, and municipalities with significant economic injuries from violations of antitrust, consumer protection, and data privacy laws, with cases regularly involving unlawful digital tracking, surreptitious collection of biometric information, and theft of sensitive data and information in data breaches. Reporting on his cases has appeared in ESPN, The New York Times, Reuters, The Wall Street Journal, CNN, Law360, Yahoo! News, Law.com, and Bloomberg.

• Education & Credentials

Mr. Yagman earned his Juris Doctor from the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, where his studies concentrated in Data and Intellectual Property Law, and his Bachelor of Arts from the University of Miami. He is admitted to the state courts of New York and Washington, D.C., and to the United States District Courts for the Southern District of New York, the Eastern District of New York, the District of Columbia, the District of Maryland, the District of Colorado, the Northern District of Illinois, and the Western District of Wisconsin.

• Recognition & Leadership

Mr. Yagman holds court-facing leadership roles in complex consumer class actions. He serves in an interim co-lead capacity for a proposed class of millions of New Yorkers harmed by a significant data breach of New York’s municipal hospital system, the largest municipal hospital system in the United States. He is a member of the steering committee representing a class of consumer egg purchasers who allege they paid supra competitive prices for shell eggs as a result of a purported algorithmic benchmarking scheme. He has also been named to the District of Columbia Capital Pro Bono Honor Roll.

• Professional Involvement

Mr. Yagman is a member of the Antitrust and Consumer Law Committee of the District of Columbia Bar Association and of the LGBTQ Bar Association of New York City. He has delivered guest lectures and symposium presentations at the University of Miami, the University of California (Irvine) School of Law, the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, Hofstra University’s Deane School of Law, and the University of Minnesota School of Law. He is a Founding Member of the Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library and belongs to The United States Supreme Court Historical Society, The Theodore Roosevelt Association, and Friends of Sagamore Hill.

• Experience

For nearly a decade, Mr. Yagman has litigated against corporations accused of misconduct at the intersection of economic and social justice. His work in pricing and data cases includes the first ever consumer class action addressing surveillance pricing, in which airfares were allegedly adjusted according to sensitive information collected about each purchaser, and a proposed class of hundreds of independent pharmacies whose reimbursement rates for generic pharmaceutical sales were allegedly suppressed through algorithmic price fixing by pharmacy benefit managers. His data privacy matters include a data breach case of first impression brought on behalf of a proposed class of over 200 million victims against a social media company, a class of millions of minor plaintiffs in Illinois whose biometric data was allegedly collected by a social media company without adequate consent, and a proposed class of millions of concert and sporting event attendees who allegedly had their biometric data collected unlawfully by a well-known sporting venue. He has also represented a proposed class of airline ticket purchasers who paid supra-competitive prices due to an alleged unlawful agreement between two major airlines, a class of gasoline purchasers across an entire state who paid higher prices due to collusion by spot market financial traders, and a proposed class of sporting event ticket purchasers who were not refunded after a COVID-19 shortened and fan-less season. He also regularly represents purchasers of products and services that are mislabeled or sold using unfair acts and practices.

SESSION 1 – Pleading Surveillance-Pricing Class Claims Under Federal Wiretap and State ConsumerProtection Law | 2:30pm – 3:30pm

This session examines the pleading architecture of the first wave of surveillance-pricing class actions, with focus on the ECPA crime-tort exception theory and parallel state consumer-protection claims. Attorneys will learn how plaintiffs in cases like Phillips v. JetBlue have structured complaints naming both platform operators and data vendors, how courts are splitting on the wiretap theory, and how New York’s Algorithmic Pricing Disclosure Act and the broader state legislative surge are reshaping the litigation landscape. Attendees will leave with concrete pleading guidance — including the admissions-mining strategy, vendor-as-interceptor framing, and the class certification pitfalls specific to personalized pricing claims.

BREAK | 3:30pm – 3:40pm

SESSION 2 – Litigating the First Private Right of Action for Surveillance Pricing | 3:40pm – 4:40pm

This session examines the litigation mechanics of the first consumer private right of action for surveillance pricing, anchored in New Jersey’s Fair Price Protection Act (effective February 1, 2027) and the emerging multi-state statutory landscape. Attendees will learn how to evaluate forum selection, plead the personaldata nexus, structure class definitions, and build a discovery plan against algorithmic pricing defendants. Attorneys will leave able to assess which jurisdictions support viable claims, anticipate class certification battlegrounds, and avoid the common pleading and standing errors that will sink first-wave complaints.