Court Opinion

ID: 9926137
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-01-23 21:01:35.584939+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:22:07.566560
License: Public Domain

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                                              PUBLISHED

                               UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
                                   FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

                                               No. 22-1119

        CAREER COUNSELING, INC., d/b/a Snelling Staffing Services, a South Carolina
        corporation, individually and as the representative of a class of similarly-situated
        persons,

                             Plaintiff – Appellant,

                      v.

        AMERIFACTORS FINANCIAL GROUP, LLC,

                             Defendant – Appellee,

                      and

        JOHN DOES 1-5,

                             Defendants.

                                               No. 22-1136

        CAREER COUNSELING, INC., d/b/a Snelling Staffing Services, a South Carolina
        corporation, individually and as the representative of a class of similarly-situated
        persons,

                             Plaintiff – Appellee,
                     v.

        AMERIFACTORS FINANCIAL GROUP, LLC,
USCA4 Appeal: 22-1119      Doc: 40        Filed: 01/22/2024   Pg: 2 of 22

                            Defendant – Appellant,

                     and

        JOHN DOES 1-5,

                            Defendants.

        Appeals from the United States District Court for the District of South Carolina, at
        Columbia. J. Michelle Childs, District Judge. (3:16-cv-03013-JMC)

        ARGUED: December 9, 2022                                    Decided: January 22, 2024

        Before WILKINSON, NIEMEYER, and KING, Circuit Judges.

        Affirmed by published opinion. Judge King wrote the opinion, in which Judge Wilkinson
        and Judge Niemeyer joined.

        ARGUED: Glenn Lorne Hara, ANDERSON & WANCA, Rolling Meadows, Illinois, for
        Appellant/Cross-Appellee. Lauri Anne Mazzuchetti, KELLEY DRYE & WARREN, LLP,
        Parsippany, New Jersey, for Appellee/Cross-Appellant. ON BRIEF: John G. Felder, Jr.,
        MCGOWAN HOOD FELDER, Columbia, South Carolina, for Appellant/Cross-Appellee.
        William H. Latham, Jonathan M. Knicely, NELSON MULLINS RILEY &
        SCARBOROUGH LLP, Columbia, South Carolina, for Appellee/Cross-Appellant.

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        KING, Circuit Judge:

               In this putative class action initiated in the District of South Carolina, it is alleged

        that defendant AmeriFactors Financial Group, LLC, sent an unsolicited advertisement by

        fax to plaintiff Career Counseling, Inc., and thousands of other recipients, in contravention

        of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991 (the “TCPA”), as amended by the Junk

        Fax Prevention Act of 2005. By its appeal (No. 22-1119), Career Counseling contests the

        district court’s Order and Opinion denying class certification. See Career Counseling, Inc.

        v. AmeriFactors Fin. Grp., LLC, No. 3:16-cv-03013 (D.S.C. July 16, 2021), ECF No. 229

        (the “Class Certification Decision”).         And by the cross-appeal (No. 22-1136),

        AmeriFactors challenges the court’s subsequent Order and Opinion awarding summary

        judgment to Career Counseling on its individual TCPA claim. See Career Counseling, Inc.

        v. AmeriFactors Fin. Grp., LLC, No. 3:16-cv-03013 (D.S.C. Jan. 31, 2022), ECF No. 244

        (the “Summary Judgment Decision”). As explained herein, we affirm both the denial of

        class certification and the award of summary judgment.

                                                      I.

               The operative First Amended Class Action Complaint of November 2017 alleges a

        single TCPA claim premised on Career Counseling’s receipt in June 2016 of an uninvited

        fax from AmeriFactors advertising its commercial goods and services.              See Career

        Counseling, Inc. v. AmeriFactors Fin. Grp., LLC, No. 3:16-cv-03013 (D.S.C. Nov. 28,

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        2017), ECF No. 70 (the “Complaint”). 1 Relevant here, the TCPA generally makes it

        unlawful “to send, to a telephone facsimile machine, an unsolicited advertisement.” See

        47 U.S.C. § 227(b)(1)(C).

               According to the Complaint, AmeriFactors “sent facsimile transmissions of

        unsolicited advertisements to [Career Counseling] and the Class in violation of the [TCPA],

        including, but not limited to, the [fax sent to Career Counseling in June 2016].” See

        Complaint ¶ 2. Career Counseling ultimately proposed a class comprised of the nearly

        59,000 other persons and entities who were successfully sent the same June 2016 fax that

        Career Counseling received.

               As more fully discussed below, by its Class Certification Decision of July 2021, the

        district court denied Career Counseling’s request for class certification. Thereafter, by its

        Summary Judgment Decision of January 2022, the court awarded summary judgment to

        Career Counseling on its individual TCPA claim against AmeriFactors. That award

        includes $500 in statutory damages. See 47 U.S.C. § 227(b)(3)(B) (providing for recovery

        of “actual monetary loss from [a TCPA] violation, or . . . $500 in damages for each such

        violation, whichever is greater”).

               1
                  The record reflects that Career Counseling is a South Carolina corporation that
        does business as Snelling Staffing Services, an employment staffing agency that acts as a
        middleman between employers and prospective workers. AmeriFactors, a Florida limited
        liability company, is in the business of “factoring,” or purchasing another company’s
        accounts receivable of unpaid invoices for a discounted price with the intention of
        collecting the full value of the unpaid invoices at a later date. The fax sent to Career
        Counseling in June 2016 underpinning the Complaint was headlined “AmeriFactors —
        Funding Business Is Our Business” and announced that “AmeriFactors is ready to help
        your company with your financing needs.” See Complaint Ex. A, at 2.

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               Following the district court’s entry of the judgment, the parties timely noted their

        respective appeals. We possess jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1291.

                                                    II.

               We first address Career Counseling’s challenge to the district court’s Class

        Certification Decision of July 2021, denying Career Counseling’s request for class

        certification pursuant to Rules 23(a) and 23(b)(3) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.

        In so doing, we review the Class Certification Decision for abuse of discretion. See Brown

        v. Nucor Corp., 576 F.3d 149, 152 (4th Cir. 2009). A district court abuses its discretion in

        granting or denying class certification “when it materially misapplies the requirements of

        Rule 23.” See EQT Prod. Co. v. Adair, 764 F.3d 347, 357 (4th Cir. 2014). More generally,

        a court also abuses its discretion when its decision rests on an error of law or a clearly

        erroneous finding of fact. See In re Grand Jury 2021 Subpoenas, 87 F.4th 229, 250 (4th

        Cir. 2023); Hunter v. Earthgrains Co. Bakery, 281 F.3d 144, 150 (4th Cir. 2002).

                                                    A.

               As we explained in our 2014 decision in EQT Production, “Rule 23(a) requires that

        the prospective class comply with four prerequisites: (1) numerosity; (2) commonality;

        (3) typicality; and (4) adequacy of representation.” See 764 F.3d at 357. 2 Additionally,

               2
                In its entirety, under the headings “Prerequisites” for “Class Actions,” Rule 23(a)
        provides the following:

        (Continued)
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        “the class action must fall within one of the three categories enumerated in Rule 23(b),”

        with certification being appropriate under Rule 23(b)(3) when “(1) common questions of

        law or fact . . . predominate over any questions affecting only individual class members;

        and (2) proceeding as a class [is] superior to other available methods of litigation.” Id.

        (internal quotation marks omitted).      In other words, Rule 23(b)(3) requires both

        “predominance” and “superiority.” Id. at 365.

               Relying on precedent, we clarified in our EQT Production decision that Rule 23 also

        “contains an implicit threshold requirement that the members of a proposed class be

        ‘readily identifiable.’” See 764 F.3d at 358 (quoting Hammond v. Powell, 462 F.2d 1053,

        1055 (4th Cir. 1972)). Under that requirement — which is commonly referred to as

        “ascertainability” — “[a] class cannot be certified unless a court can readily identify the

        class members in reference to objective criteria.” Id. So, “if class members are impossible

               One or more members of a class may sue or be sued as representative parties
               on behalf of all members only if:

                      (1)    the class is so numerous that joinder of all members is
                             impracticable;

                      (2)    there are questions of law or fact common to the class;

                      (3)    the claims or defenses of the representative parties are
                             typical of the claims or defenses of the class; and

                      (4)    the representative parties will fairly and adequately
                             protect the interests of the class.

        See Fed. R. Civ. P. 23(a).

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        to identify without extensive and individualized fact-finding or ‘mini-trials,’ then a class

        action is inappropriate.” Id. (alteration and internal quotation marks omitted).

               The party seeking class certification must present evidence and demonstrate

        compliance with Rule 23. See EQT Prod., 764 F.3d at 357-58. Concomitantly, “the district

        court has an independent obligation to perform a ‘rigorous analysis’ to ensure that all of

        the prerequisites have been satisfied.” Id. at 358 (quoting Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. v. Dukes,

        564 U.S. 338, 351 (2011)).

                                                     B.

               In denying class certification here, the district court determined that — although

        Career Counseling has complied with the Rule 23(a) prerequisites of numerosity,

        commonality, typicality, and adequacy of representation — it has failed to satisfy Rule 23’s

        implicit further requirement of ascertainability. See Class Certification Decision 18-24. 3

        That determination derived from the uncontroverted factual premise that each of the nearly

        59,000 recipients of the June 2016 AmeriFactors fax was using either a “stand-alone fax

        machine” or an “online fax service,” as well as from the court’s legal conclusion that the

        TCPA prohibits unsolicited advertisements sent to stand-alone fax machines, but does not

        reach unsolicited advertisements sent to online fax services. Id. at 14-18. Specifically, the

        court concluded that stand-alone fax machines — but not online fax services — qualify as

               3
                 Having concluded that Career Counseling has failed to satisfy the implicit
        ascertainability requirement, the district court did not reach the issue of whether Career
        Counseling has met the Rule 23(b)(3) requirements of predominance and superiority. See
        Class Certification Decision 24.

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        “telephone facsimile machine[s]” under the TCPA. See 47 U.S.C. § 227(b)(1)(C) (making

        it unlawful “to send, to a telephone facsimile machine, an unsolicited advertisement”

        (emphasis added)). And that conclusion rendered it necessary to be able to identify which

        of the fax recipients were using stand-alone fax machines and which were using online fax

        services. Because the court was not convinced that the stand-alone fax machine users are

        readily identifiable, it decided that the ascertainability requirement has not been satisfied.

               For its interpretation of the TCPA, the district court relied on a December 2019

        declaratory ruling of the Federal Communications Commission (the “FCC”) that “an online

        fax service . . . is not a ‘telephone facsimile machine’ and thus falls outside the scope of

        the statutory prohibition [on sending unsolicited advertisements by fax].”                     See

        AmeriFactors Fin. Grp., LLC, 34 F.C.C.R. 11950, 11950-51 (2019) (the “AmeriFactors

        FCC Ruling”). The AmeriFactors FCC Ruling was sought by defendant AmeriFactors for

        purposes of this very litigation, and it was issued by the Chief of the FCC’s Consumer and

        Governmental Affairs Bureau.

               As explained in the Class Certification Decision, the district court deemed itself

        without jurisdiction to review the AmeriFactors FCC Ruling and bound to defer to it

        pursuant to the Administrative Orders Review Act, or Hobbs Act. See 28 U.S.C. § 2342(1)

        (specifying, in pertinent part, that “[t]he court of appeals . . . has exclusive jurisdiction . . .

        to determine the validity of . . . all final orders of the Federal Communications Commission

        made reviewable by section 402(a) of title 47”); see also PDR Network, LLC v. Carlton &

        Harris Chiropractic, Inc., 139 S. Ct. 2051, 2055-56 (2019) (outlining factors to be

        considered when deciding whether Hobbs Act obliges district court to follow particular

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        FCC order). That is, upon assessing the relevant factors, the court concluded that it was

        “required to find that the [AmeriFactors FCC Ruling] is entitled to Hobbs Act deference.”

        See Class Certification Decision 18.

               Next, in conducting its ascertainability analysis and resolving that it could not

        readily identify the fax recipients eligible for class membership under the AmeriFactors

        FCC Ruling — i.e., those recipients who were using stand-alone fax machines rather than

        online fax services — the district court rejected as “deficient” Career Counseling’s

        proffered method of identifying the stand-alone fax machine users. See Class Certification

        Decision 23. Moreover, the court concluded “that it would need to make an individualized

        inquiry of each [fax recipient] to determine if [that recipient was a stand-alone fax machine

        user].” Id. As such, the court ruled that the class “is not ascertainable” and that “class

        certification is inappropriate.” Id. at 23-24.

                                                         C.

               By its appeal, Career Counseling challenges the district court’s Class Certification

        Decision on multiple fronts.      We do not, however, accept any of its arguments as

        meritorious.

                                                         1.

               As a threshold matter, Career Counseling urges us to abandon our precedents

        recognizing that Rule 23 contains an implicit ascertainability requirement. In other words,

        Career Counseling would have us rule that the district court committed legal error in

        denying class certification for failure to satisfy the ascertainability requirement, because

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        — notwithstanding our precedents holding to the contrary — no such requirement actually

        exists.

                  Of course, as a three-judge panel of this Court, we are simply unable to rule as

        Career Counseling proposes. That is because our Court adheres to “the basic principle that

        one panel cannot overrule a decision issued by another panel.” See McMellon v. United

        States, 387 F.3d 329, 332 (4th Cir. 2004) (en banc). Indeed, other panels of this Court have

        continued to acknowledge and enforce the ascertainability requirement. See, e.g., Peters

        v. Aetna Inc., 2 F.4th 199, 241-43 (4th Cir. 2021); Krakauer v. Dish Network, L.L.C., 925

        F.3d 643, 654-55, 658 (4th Cir. 2019). And we now do the same. 4

                                                      2.

                  Accepting that there is an ascertainability requirement, Career Counseling argues

        that the district court committed legal error in according Hobbs Act deference to the

        AmeriFactors FCC Ruling that an online fax service does not qualify as a “telephone

        facsimile machine” under the TCPA.          Career Counseling further contends that the

        AmeriFactors FCC Ruling is no more than an interpretive rule and thus is not entitled to

        deference under Chevron, U.S.A., Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 467

        U.S. 837 (1984). See Carlton & Harris Chiropractic, Inc. v. PDR Network, LLC, 982 F.3d

        258, 264 (4th Cir. 2020) (addressing an FCC rule interpreting the meaning of the TCPA

                 In recognition of the controlling principle that a three-judge panel of this Court
                  4

        cannot overrule a Circuit precedent, Career Counseling sought an initial en banc review of
        its appeal. But our Court denied that request. See Career Counseling, Inc. v. AmeriFactors
        Fin. Grp., LLC, No. 22-1119 (4th Cir. June 1, 2022), ECF No. 16 (Order denying initial en
        banc review).

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        term “unsolicited advertisement” and declining to accord that interpretative rule Chevron

        deference because it “doesn’t carry the force and effect of law”). Although Career

        Counseling acknowledges that the AmeriFactors FCC Ruling might be entitled to

        deference under Skidmore v. Swift & Co., 323 U.S. 134 (1944), Career Counseling asserts

        that the AmeriFactors FCC Ruling fails on its merits to qualify for such deference. See

        Carlton & Harris, 982 F.3d at 264 (explaining “that an interpretive rule is entitled to

        [Skidmore deference] only to the extent it has the power to persuade” (internal quotation

        marks omitted)).     Additionally, Career Counseling maintains that — even if the

        AmeriFactors FCC Ruling is somehow entitled to Hobbs Act, Chevron, or Skidmore

        deference — that ruling (issued in December 2019) cannot be applied retroactively in these

        proceedings (assessing the legality of the underlying June 2016 AmeriFactors fax).

        According to Career Counseling, the district court therefore incorrectly limited class

        membership to stand-alone fax machine users and erroneously required Career Counseling

        to show the ascertainability of those particular fax recipients.

               Put simply, we need not assess or determine whether the district court erred in

        according Hobbs Act deference to the AmeriFactors FCC Ruling, whether the ruling is

        otherwise entitled to Chevron or Skidmore deference, or whether the ruling can be applied

        retroactively. Instead, we are satisfied to rule — de novo — that pursuant to its plain

        statutory language, the TCPA prohibits the sending of unsolicited advertisements to what

        the district court labelled as “stand-alone fax machines,” but not to what the court accepted

        to be “online fax services.” And we therefore conclude that the court properly limited class

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        membership to stand-alone fax machine users and required Career Counseling to

        demonstrate their ascertainability.

               Again, the TCPA prohibits “send[ing], to a telephone facsimile machine, an

        unsolicited advertisement.” See 47 U.S.C. § 227(b)(1)(C). More fully, the TCPA renders

        it unlawful “to use any telephone facsimile machine, computer, or other device to send, to

        a telephone facsimile machine, an unsolicited advertisement.” Id. And the TCPA defines

        a “telephone facsimile machine” as

               equipment which has the capacity (A) to transcribe text or images, or both,
               from paper into an electronic signal and to transmit that signal over a regular
               telephone line, or (B) to transcribe text or images (or both) from an electronic
               signal received over a regular telephone line onto paper.

        Id. § 227(a)(3). Thus, to fall within the § 227(b)(1)(C) prohibition, a fax can be sent from

        a “telephone facsimile machine” (as defined in § 227(a)(3)), or from a “computer,” or from

        some “other device.” But that fax can be received in only one way: on a “telephone

        facsimile machine” (also as defined in § 227(a)(3)).

               Meanwhile, the district court labelled as a “stand-alone fax machine” what is well

        understood to be a “traditional fax machine.” See Class Certification Decision 11-12. As

        for an “online fax service,” the court deferred to the AmeriFactors FCC Ruling and thereby

        accepted that

               [a]n online fax service is a cloud-based service consisting of a fax server or
               similar device that is used to send or receive documents, images and/or
               electronic files in digital format over telecommunications facilities that
               allows users to access faxes the same way that they do email: by logging
               into a server over the Internet or by receiving a pdf attachment as an email.

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        See AmeriFactors, 34 F.C.C.R. at 11950 (alteration and internal quotation marks omitted).

        More simply stated, “online fax services hold inbound faxes in digital form on a cloud-

        based server, where the user accesses the document via the online portal or via an email

        attachment.” Id. at 11953. When faxes are sent to such online fax services, the recipients

        “can manage those messages the same way they manage email by blocking senders or

        deleting incoming messages without printing them.” Id. That is, the recipients have “the

        option to view, delete, or print [the faxes] as desired.” Id. Importantly, “an online fax

        service cannot itself print a fax — the user of an online fax service must connect his or her

        own equipment in order to do so.” Id. Moreover, online fax “services can handle multiple

        simultaneous incoming transmissions,” such that “receipt of any one fax does not render

        the service unavailable for others.” Id.

               It is clear to us that — whereas a stand-alone fax machine is the quintessential

        “equipment which has the capacity . . . to transcribe text or images (or both) from an

        electronic signal received over a regular telephone line onto paper,” see 47 U.S.C.

        § 227(a)(3)(B) — an online fax service is not such equipment and thus cannot be said to

        qualify as a “telephone facsimile machine” under the TCPA. That is because an online fax

        service neither receives an electronic signal “over a regular telephone line” nor has the

        capacity to transcribe text or images “onto paper.” Rather, online fax services receive faxes

        over the Internet and cannot themselves print any faxes.         Accord AmeriFactors, 34

        F.C.C.R. at 11953-54 (similarly recognizing that “online fax services differ in critical ways

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        from the traditional faxes sent to telephone facsimile machines Congress addressed in the

        TCPA”). 5

               To be sure, an online fax service may qualify as a “computer” or some “other

        device” within the meaning of the TCPA. With respect to a “computer” or “other device,”

        however, the 47 U.S.C. § 227(b)(1)(C) prohibition applies only to faxes sent from a

        “computer” or “other device” — and not to faxes sent to a “computer” or “other device”

        — as a result of the meaningful variances in § 227(b)(1)(C)’s language. See Rush v.

        Kijakazi, 65 F.4th 114, 120 (4th Cir. 2023) (quoting Russello v. United States, 464 U.S. 16,

        23 (1983), for the proposition that “[w]here Congress includes particular language in one

        section of a statute but omits it in another section of the same Act, it is generally presumed

        that Congress acts intentionally and purposely in the disparate inclusion or exclusion”).

               Notably, although we rely solely on the plain statutory language for our conclusion

        that an online fax service does not qualify as a “telephone facsimile machine” under the

        TCPA, this interpretation is consistent with the 1991 Report of the House Committee on

        Energy and Commerce recommending the TCPA’s enactment. See H.R. Rep. No. 102-

               5
                  In arguing that an online fax service qualifies as a “telephone facsimile machine”
        under the TCPA, Career Counseling invokes as persuasive authority the Sixth Circuit’s
        decision in Lyngaas v. AG, 992 F.3d 412 (6th Cir. 2021). The question in Lyngaas was
        whether “a TCPA claim is not actionable if the unsolicited advertisement is received by
        any device (such as a computer through an ‘efax’) other than a traditional fax machine.”
        See 992 F.3d at 425. The court concluded that a device other than a traditional fax machine
        may qualify as a “telephone facsimile machine” under the TCPA, including a computer
        receiving an efax. Id. at 425-27. Lyngaas is not helpful to Career Counseling, however,
        in that it defines an “efax” as something different from an online fax service and specifies
        that an efax “is sent over a telephone line” rather than “as an email over the Internet.” Id.
        at 427 (emphasis and internal quotation marks omitted).

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        317 (1991). In relevant part, after explaining that the “[f]acsimile machines [of the time

        were] designed to accept, process, and print all messages which arrive over their dedicated

        lines,” the Report specified “two reasons” why the sending of unsolicited advertisements

        by fax was “problematic”: (1) “it shifts some of the costs of advertising [including ink and

        paper costs] from the sender to the recipient”; and (2) “it occupies the recipient’s facsimile

        machine so that it is unavailable for legitimate business messages while processing and

        printing the junk fax.” Id. at 10. While those problems continue to exist with stand-alone

        fax machines, they do not exist with online fax services, as the recipient can choose whether

        the print a particular fax and there can be multiple incoming transmissions at once.

               At bottom, we agree with the district court — albeit based on the plain statutory

        language, rather than any sort of deference to the AmeriFactors FCC Ruling — that an

        online fax service does not qualify as a “telephone facsimile machine” under the TCPA.

        Consequently, we further agree with the court that class membership must be limited to

        stand-alone fax machine users and that Career Counseling must be able to demonstrate

        their ascertainability.

                                                      3.

               Finally, accepting that there is an ascertainability requirement and that class

        membership is properly limited to stand-alone fax machine users, Career Counseling

        contends that the district court erred in rejecting as “deficient” Career Counseling’s method

        of identifying the stand-alone fax machine users and in deeming the class to be “not

        ascertainable.” See Class Certification Decision 23. We do not, however, perceive any

        abuse of the court’s discretion.

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               As detailed in the Class Certification Decision, to identify which of the nearly

        59,000 recipients of the June 2016 AmeriFactors fax were using stand-alone fax machines

        and which were using online fax services, Career Counseling sent a subpoena to the

        telephone carrier associated with each recipient’s fax number. See Class Certification

        Decision 19. The subpoena asked, inter alia, whether the carrier provided an online fax

        service in connection with the particular number. Id. at 19 & n.10. According to Career

        Counseling, as of mid-March 2021, it had received responses indicating that more than

        20,000 of the recipients were not — and only 206 of the recipients were — provided online

        fax services by the subpoenaed carriers. Id. at 19. From there, Career Counseling asserted

        that the more than 20,000 recipients without online fax services from the subpoenaed

        carriers “thus received the [June 2016 AmeriFactors fax] on a stand[-]alone fax machine.”

        Id. at 20 (second alteration in original) (internal quotation marks omitted). As Career

        Counseling would have it, a class consisting of more than 20,000 stand-alone fax machine

        users is therefore ascertainable. Id.

               Significantly, however, AmeriFactors proffered its own evidence showing that the

        recipients were not necessarily using stand-alone fax machines just because they were not

        using online fax services from the subpoenaed carriers. See Class Certification Decision

        22. Rather, under AmeriFactors’s evidence, the recipients may have been using online fax

        services provided by someone else. Id. For example, a declaration of an employee of

        Charter Communications Operating, Inc., stated with respect to each of the nearly 1,300

        recipients with Charter-associated fax numbers that there was no way for Charter to

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        determine whether the recipient was using “another provider’s online fax service product”

        or “a stand-alone fax machine.” Id. (internal quotation marks omitted).

               Upon “considering the totality of evidence presented by the parties,” the district

        court ruled that Career Counseling failed to present sufficient evidence that the more than

        20,000 recipients without online fax services from the subpoenaed carriers were instead

        using stand-alone fax machines. See Class Certification Decision 23. As such, the court

        recognized that it would be left to make an individualized inquiry as to whether each

        recipient was using a stand-alone fax machine at the relevant time, rendering the class of

        stand-alone fax machine users “not ascertainable” and class certification “inappropriate.”

        Id. at 23-24.

               On appeal, Career Counseling contends that the district court should have accepted

        its method of identifying the stand-alone fax machine users, in that — although there is

        evidence that those recipients could have instead been using online fax services provided

        by someone other than the subpoenaed carriers — there is no evidence that any recipient

        was actually doing so. The existing evidence alone, however, refutes the premise of Career

        Counseling’s identification method: that recipients who were not using online fax services

        from the subpoenaed carriers were necessarily using stand-alone fax machines. As such,

        we cannot say that the district court abused its discretion in ruling that Career Counseling

        failed to meet its burden of demonstrating the ascertainability of the class. And we thus

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        are satisfied to affirm the court’s denial of Career Counseling’s request for class

        certification. 6

                                                   III.

                Next, we address AmeriFactors’s cross-appeal challenge to the district court’s

        Summary Judgment Decision of January 2022, awarding summary judgment to Career

        Counseling on its individual TCPA claim. We review the Summary Judgment Decision

        de novo, viewing the facts in the light most favorable to AmeriFactors, as the non-moving

        party. See Chapman v. Oakland Living Ctr., Inc., 48 F.4th 222, 228 (4th Cir. 2022).

        Pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 56(a), summary judgment is appropriate only

        when “the movant shows that there is no genuine dispute as to any material fact and the

        movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.”

                Career Counseling’s TCPA claim requires a showing that AmeriFactors “sen[t], to

        a telephone facsimile machine, an unsolicited advertisement.”             See 47 U.S.C.

        § 227(b)(1)(C). There has been no dispute that the June 2016 AmeriFactors fax was sent

        to a “telephone facsimile machine,” as the evidence is that Career Counseling was using a

        stand-alone fax machine at the relevant time. See Summary Judgment Decision 4 & n.5,

        10-11. There also has been no dispute that the fax was “unsolicited,” see id. at 10-11,

                6
                 In these circumstances, we need not consider alternative bases for affirmance
        raised by AmeriFactors on appeal, including that Career Counseling has not complied with
        the Rule 23(a) prerequisite of adequacy of representation and has not met the Rule 23(b)(3)
        requirements of predominance and superiority.

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        meaning “transmitted to any person without that person’s prior express invitation or

        permission, in writing or otherwise,” see 47 U.S.C. § 227(a)(5). Although AmeriFactors

        unsuccessfully argued in the district court that the fax does not constitute an

        “advertisement,” see Summary Judgment Decision 11-14 — i.e., “any material advertising

        the commercial availability or quality of any property, goods, or services,” see 47 U.S.C.

        § 227(a)(5) — it has abandoned that contention on appeal.           Cf. Carlton & Harris

        Chiropractic, Inc. v. PDR Network, LLC, 80 F.4th 466, 470-72 (4th Cir. 2023) (continuing

        litigation over whether fax constituted “advertisement” within meaning of TCPA).

               What AmeriFactors argued in the district court that it continues to assert in this

        Court is that there is a genuine dispute of material fact as to whether it is liable as the

        “sender” of the fax. See Summary Judgment Decision 14-20. AmeriFactors relies for its

        argument on a declaratory ruling of the FCC that was issued by the Chief of the Consumer

        and Governmental Affairs Bureau in September 2020 in response to a petition filed by a

        non-party to these proceedings. See Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP, 35 F.C.C.R.

        10424 (2020) (the “Akin Gump FCC Ruling”). The Akin Gump FCC Ruling explained that,

        by way of its rules, the FCC “define[s] the term ‘sender’ of a fax advertisement as ‘the

        person or entity on whose behalf a facsimile unsolicited advertisement is sent or whose

        goods or services are advertised or promoted in the unsolicited advertisement.’” Id. at

        10424 (quoting rule found at 47 C.F.R. § 64.1200(f)(11) as of January 8, 2024).

               The Akin Gump FCC Ruling, however, sought to clarify liability in situations in

        which the “advertiser” utilized the services of a “fax broadcaster” to send a TCPA-violating

        fax advertisement on the advertiser’s behalf. See Akin Gump, 35 F.C.C.R. at 10425.

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        According to the Akin Gump FCC Ruling, “a fax broadcaster may be exclusively liable for

        TCPA violations where it engages in deception or fraud against the advertiser, such as

        securing an advertiser’s business by falsely representing that the broadcaster has consumer

        consent for certain faxes.” Id. at 10426. That is, “the fax broadcaster, not the advertiser,

        is the sole ‘sender’ of a fax for the purposes of the TCPA when it engages in conduct such

        as fraud or deception against an advertiser if such conduct leaves the advertiser unable to

        control the fax campaign or prevent TCPA violations.” Id. at 10427.

               Invoking the Akin Gump FCC Ruling, AmeriFactors asserts that — although it was

        the advertiser in the June 2016 fax received by Career Counseling — it is not liable as the

        fax’s “sender” because it was defrauded and deceived by a fax broadcaster it employed to

        disseminate the fax on its behalf.     As proof of the fraud and deception it alleges,

        AmeriFactors points to the following evidence: that the June 2016 fax was AmeriFactors’s

        first and only fax advertisement; that AmeriFactors engaged a company called AdMax as

        the fax broadcaster and relied upon AdMax’s advice and expertise; that AdMax prepared

        the list of fax recipients, including Career Counseling; that AdMax knew that the TCPA

        prohibits sending unsolicited fax advertisements but failed to advise AmeriFactors of the

        illegality of the June 2016 fax; and that AdMax merely advised AmeriFactors to include

        language in the fax alerting the recipient how to opt out of receiving future faxes, leading

        AmeriFactors to believe that was all it needed to do to comply with the law. AmeriFactors

        maintains that the foregoing evidence demonstrates that AdMax made material

        misrepresentations that, pursuant to the Akin Gump FCC Ruling, relieve AmeriFactors of

        “sender” liability.

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               In response, Career Counseling contests both the applicability of the Akin Gump

        FCC Ruling and the sufficiency of AmeriFactors’s proof of fraud and deception. Career

        Counseling highlights the lack of any evidence that AdMax affirmatively and falsely

        represented to AmeriFactors that the June 2016 fax was legal. Indeed, the record reflects

        that AmeriFactors never questioned AdMax about the general legality of sending the fax

        or AdMax’s recommendation to include the opt-out language. Rather, AmeriFactors

        simply discussed with AdMax the services it would provide and the cost for those services,

        and then AmeriFactors instructed AdMax to disseminate the fax to the recipients on the

        AdMax-prepared list.

               By its Summary Judgment Decision, the district court recognized the applicability

        of the Akin Gump FCC Ruling but rejected AmeriFactors’s evidence as insufficient to

        “create an issue of material fact regarding whether [AdMax] made false statements of

        material fact.” See Summary Judgment Decision 17-18. Specifically, the court concluded

        that AmeriFactors’s evidence “does not establish how any statement made by [AdMax]

        was materially false.” Id. at 18.

               Assuming that the Akin Gump FCC Ruling is applicable — without unnecessarily

        assessing and deciding that question — we agree with the district court that there is

        insufficient evidence of any fraud and deception to place AmeriFactors’s “sender” liability

        in dispute. AmeriFactors thus being liable for sending the June 2016 fax, we affirm the

        court’s award of summary judgment to Career Counseling.

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                                                 IV.

              Pursuant to the foregoing, we affirm the district court’s denial of Career

        Counseling’s request for class certification, as well as the court’s award of summary

        judgment to Career Counseling on its individual TCPA claim against AmeriFactors.

                                                                                 AFFIRMED

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