Written by: Haim Ravia, Dotan Hammer
On March 2, 2026, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit issued a significant decision in *Freeman v. 3Commas Technologies OÜ*, reversing a district court’s dismissal of a class action against an Estonian cryptocurrency trading software company for lack of personal jurisdiction in California. The ruling provides important guidance on when foreign technology companies that operate online platforms can be subject to jurisdiction in U.S. courts—a question of growing importance as cross-border digital services proliferate.
The plaintiffs, a class of California residents, alleged data breach claims after their 3Commas account credentials were compromised. The district court had dismissed the case, finding no personal jurisdiction over the Estonian company. The Ninth Circuit reversed, applying the framework from its landmark 2025 en banc decision in *Briskin v. Shopify*, which established that “a company’s internet activity may subject the company to specific personal jurisdiction in a given forum if the company knows—either actually or constructively—about its customer base there and exploits that base for commercial gain.”
The court found that 3Commas had purposefully directed its activities toward California through several deliberate contacts. First, 3Commas contracted with Cloudflare, a California-based data server company, to optimize and maintain the availability of its website, and that contract contained choice-of-law and forum selection clauses for California. Second, 3Commas’s Privacy Policy page included a section on California Privacy Rights without mentioning any other jurisdiction’s legal requirements, indicating an intentional direction of activities toward California consumers. Third, the company collected users’ financial information and geographical data through IP addresses and billing addresses, enabling it to identify the location of its users. The court cited the Supreme Court’s decision in *Burger King Corp. v. Rudzewicz* for the proposition that entering into contracts expressly providing for California law forms a basis for personal jurisdiction.
The court concluded that these contacts were “not random or fortuitous but rather reflect 3Commas’s intention to appeal to and profit from an audience in California.” Exercising jurisdiction also comported with fair play and substantial justice: 3Commas had already agreed to resolve disputes with Cloudflare in California under California law; the burden of defending in California was therefore limited; litigating in California was unlikely to undermine Estonian sovereignty since plaintiffs only asserted claims under U.S. state law; and California maintains a strong interest in providing redress for its residents.
Click here to read the Ninth Circuit’s decision in *Freeman v. 3Commas Technologies OÜ*.
