Geoffrey Graber

Geoffrey Graber is a partner in Cohen Milstein's Consumer Protection practice, where he focuses on representing consumers in complex class action litigation involving issues of false advertising, fraud, data privacy theft and other forms of unfair business practices at the hands of social media companies, banks, insurance, health care companies, and other consumer providers. Mr. Graber also has extensive experience representing whistleblowers in qui tam litigation under the False Claims Act and whistleblower programs under the U.S. Securities Exchange (SEC), U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT), and U.S. Department of Defense (DOD).

Prior to joining Cohen Milstein in 2015, Mr. Graber had a distinguished career at the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), where he was part of the Department's senior leadership team serving as Deputy Associate Attorney General and Director of the DOJ's Residential Mortgage-Backed Securities (RMBS) Working Group. As the Director of the RMBS Working Group, Mr. Graber oversaw the DOJ’s nationwide investigation into the packaging and sale of mortgage-backed securities (MBS) - the catalyst for the 2008 financial crisis - ultimately recovering more than $36 billion from banks, including the record-breaking $16.65 billion settlement with Bank of America – the largest settlement with a single entity in U.S. history – as well as settlements with Citigroup ($7 billion) and JP Morgan ($13 billion).

Earlier in his tenure at the DOJ, Mr. Graber served as Counsel in the Civil Division, where he led the three-year investigation (2004 – 2007) of Standard & Poor’s (S&P) and its ratings of structured finance products. The investigation, which made groundbreaking use of the Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery and Enforcement Act of 1989 (FIRREA), resulted in the largest enforcement action filed by the United States concerning the financial crisis (United States v. Standard & Poor’s).  As a result of his successful work on S&P, Mr. Graber earned the Attorney General’s Distinguished Service Award in 2015. Mr. Graber also received the Attorney General’s Distinguished Service Award in 2014 for his work relating to the $13 billion settlement with JP Morgan – including, at the time, the largest FIRREA penalty recovered by the DOJ.

Mr. Graber’s distinguished background and experience has proven invaluable to his private sector clients.

Mr. Graber is currently litigating the following high-profile matters:

• DZ Reserve, et al. v. Facebook (N.D. Cal.):  Mr. Graber serves as lead counsel representing advertisers who claim that Facebook’s key advertising metrics (Potential Reach and Estimated Daily Reach) are false and misleading due to systemic inflation of Facebook’s user base. The Court granted class certification on March 29, 2022.
• Ariza v. Luxottica Retail North America (LensCrafters) (E.D.N.Y.): Mr. Graber represents purchasers of LensCrafters’ Accufit Digital Measurement System (Accufit) services, who allege that LensCrafters used false, misleading advertising and deceptive sales practices about Accufit being “five times more accurate” in measuring pupillary distance than traditional methods, to induce customers into purchasing LensCrafters' higher-priced prescription lens products. The Court granted class certification on December 13, 2021.

Mr. Graber’s recent successes include:

• LLE One, LLC v. Facebook (N.D. Cal.): Mr. Graber served on the co-lead counsel team representing a class of advertising purchasers who claimed that Facebook breached its implied duty to perform with reasonable care and violated California’s Unfair Competition Law by intentionally miscalculating and inflating metrics related to its video advertisement services. If not for these miscalculations, plaintiffs claim, they would not have purchased more video advertisements and at a higher price than they otherwise would have paid.  In June 2020, the Court granted final approval of a $40 million settlement against Facebook.
• In re Anthem, Inc. Data Breach Litigation (N.D. Cal.):  Cohen Milstein was co-lead counsel in a certified class action involving the 2015 cyberattack and massive data breach of Anthem, Inc., one of the nation’s largest for-profit managed health care companies, which resulted in the theft of personal identification and health information of 78.8 million insureds. On August 16, 2018, the Court granted final approval to a $115 million settlement in this class action – the largest data breach settlement in U.S. history.  Mr. Graber was involved in all aspects of the litigation.

Before joining the DOJ, Mr. Graber was an associate at a top-tier defense law firm, where he defended Fortune 500 companies and their officers and directors in securities and derivative suits, consumer class actions and government investigations.  Mr. Graber also devoted substantial time to pro bono representation of indigent individuals and families in civil rights actions against local law enforcement.

Mr. Graber received his undergraduate degree in Philosophy from Vassar College and earned his law degree from the University of Southern California Law School, where he served as the Managing Articles Editor on Southern California Law Review.