A federal judge in San Jose has put to rest the remnants of a lawsuit that initially sought billions of dollars in damages from Facebook Inc. alleging that the social media giant snooped on users' browsing habits even when they were logged out of their Facebook accounts.

U.S. District Judge Edward Davila of the Northern District of California on Friday granted Facebook's motion to dismiss the few remaining claims in In re Facebook Internet Tracking Litigation. The multidistrict litigation, which dates back to 2012, claimed that Facebook used browser cookies that could track and store users' web surfing history even after they logged out of the social networking site.

This marks the third time Davila has granted a motion to dismiss in the suit, but the Friday decision leaves the plaintiffs no opportunity to amend their complaint.

Davila had already largely defanged the suit two years ago by knocking out claims against Facebook under the federal Wiretap Act and Stored Communications Act, as well as California's Invasion of Privacy Act—decades-old laws that carry stiff statutory penalties ranging up to thousands of dollars per violation. Given the size of Facebook's user base, potential damages at one time were estimated to be more than $15 billion.

Davila's previous ruling found that Facebook's alleged tracking activity didn't violate those statutes, giving plaintiffs the opportunity to refile their claims for breach of contract and breach of good faith.

Friday's order did away with those remaining claims with prejudice. Davila found that Facebook's data use policy and content on Facebook's help pages—which plaintiffs pointed to to justify their remaining contract-related claims—weren't actually incorporated into Facebook's user agreement.

David A. Straite of Kaplan Fox & Kilsheimer, one of the co-lead counsel in the case alongside Stephen Grygiel at Silverman, Thompson, Slutkin & White, said in an email that class counsel had no immediate comment.

Facebook's outside lawyer, Michael Rhodes of Cooley, directed a request for comment to the company. In an emailed statement, Natalie Naugle, Facebook's associate general counsel, said that the company was pleased with the court's “well-reasoned ruling.”

A federal judge in San Jose has put to rest the remnants of a lawsuit that initially sought billions of dollars in damages from Facebook Inc. alleging that the social media giant snooped on users' browsing habits even when they were logged out of their Facebook accounts.

U.S. District Judge Edward Davila of the Northern District of California on Friday granted Facebook's motion to dismiss the few remaining claims in In re Facebook Internet Tracking Litigation. The multidistrict litigation, which dates back to 2012, claimed that Facebook used browser cookies that could track and store users' web surfing history even after they logged out of the social networking site.

This marks the third time Davila has granted a motion to dismiss in the suit, but the Friday decision leaves the plaintiffs no opportunity to amend their complaint.

Davila had already largely defanged the suit two years ago by knocking out claims against Facebook under the federal Wiretap Act and Stored Communications Act, as well as California's Invasion of Privacy Act—decades-old laws that carry stiff statutory penalties ranging up to thousands of dollars per violation. Given the size of Facebook's user base, potential damages at one time were estimated to be more than $15 billion.

Davila's previous ruling found that Facebook's alleged tracking activity didn't violate those statutes, giving plaintiffs the opportunity to refile their claims for breach of contract and breach of good faith.

Friday's order did away with those remaining claims with prejudice. Davila found that Facebook's data use policy and content on Facebook's help pages—which plaintiffs pointed to to justify their remaining contract-related claims—weren't actually incorporated into Facebook's user agreement.

David A. Straite of Kaplan Fox & Kilsheimer, one of the co-lead counsel in the case alongside Stephen Grygiel at Silverman, Thompson, Slutkin & White, said in an email that class counsel had no immediate comment.

Facebook's outside lawyer, Michael Rhodes of Cooley, directed a request for comment to the company. In an emailed statement, Natalie Naugle, Facebook's associate general counsel, said that the company was pleased with the court's “well-reasoned ruling.”