Supreme Court Rules Corporations Do Not Have Personal Privacy Under the FOIA

The Supreme Court today ruled that corporations do not have personal privacy rights under FOIA Exemption 7(C). The ruling can be found here. The issue was in a case brought by AT&T, whether a corporation could be considered a person pursuant to Exemption 7(C) and therefore be provided “privacy” rights for its information under the exemption. Chief Justice Roberts wrote the opinion, which was unanimous 8-0 decision (Justice Kagan did not participate in the proceedings). The Court, in a decision which is as much a grammer lesson as a FOIA issue, found that corporations are not the same as humans pursuant to Exemption 7(C) and do not have privacy for corporate material under the exemption.