Supreme Court will take up Cisco’s bid to shut down lawsuit by Falun Gong

WASHINGTON– The Supreme Court agreed Friday to consider an appeal from tech giant Cisco seeking to end a lawsuit claiming the company’s technology was used to persecute members of the Falun Gong spiritual movement in China.

The justices, who will hear arguments in the spring, will consider an appeal ruling that would allow the lawsuit against Cisco to move forward in U.S. courts.

The court acted after the Trump administration spoke on Cisco’s behalf to urge the justices to hear the case.

Last year, an Associated Press investigation showed that U.S. technology companies largely designed and built China’s surveillance state, encouraged by both Republican and Democratic administrations, even as activists warned that such tools were being used to suppress dissent, persecute religious groups and target minorities.

In 2008, documents leaked to the press showed that Cisco viewed the “Golden Shield,” China’s Internet censorship effort, as a sales opportunity. The company cited a Chinese official calling Falun Gong an “evil cult.” A Cisco presentation reviewed by AP that same year said its products could identify more than 90 percent of Falun Gong materials on the Web.

Other presentations reviewed by AP show that Cisco presented Falun Gong materials as a “threat” and built a national information system to track Falun Gong believers. In 2011, Falun Gong members sued Cisco, alleging that the company adapted technology in Beijing that it knew would be used to track, detain and torture believers.

The question before the Supreme Court is whether a U.S. company can be held liable under two separate laws for aiding and abetting human rights violations. Cisco claims it is not liable under these laws, the 18th century Alien Tort Statute (ATS) or the Torture Victim Protection Act (TVPA), first enacted in 1991.

In recent years, the Supreme Court and presidential administrations of both parties have been skeptical of lawsuits seeking to use U.S. courts as a venue to seek justice for the actions of foreign governments, particularly those that took place abroad. In an attempt to overcome this skepticism, Falun Gong members have maintained that a substantial portion of Cisco’s activities involving China took place in the United States.

A decision is expected by early summer.