Cisco has quashed efforts brought against it over allegations that the networking giant’s tech was used to persecute Falun Gong religious believers in China.

The U.S. Supreme Court reversed a Ninth Circuit ruling relating to the dispute, narrowing a law that allowed foreign nationals to bring human rights cases before courts in the U.S.

Cisco was accused of knowingly supplying technology used in China's Golden Shield nationwide network of surveillance assets, which allowed the Chinese government to surveil and persecute members of the religious movement Falun Gong, allegations it refutes.

A 6-3 split saw the court restrict the Alien Tort Statute (ATS), which grants non-U.S. citizens the ability to file lawsuits in federal court for international law violations, even if those violations occurred outside the United States. A majority decision penned by Justice Amy Coney Barrett slammed shut a door that a 2004 case (Sosa v. Alvarez-Machain, or simply, Sosa) had left cracked open. Courts can no longer create new causes of action for violations of international law under the ATS.

In their reasoning, the majority bench found that the power to create such causes of action belongs to Congress, arguing that ATS-related cases risk messing with foreign policy.

“Asserting such authority would intrude on both Congress’s prerogative to provide rights of action and the power of the political branches to direct the Nation’s foreign policy,” Justice Barrett’s majority opinion reads. “It is therefore unsurprising that this Court has never created an ATS action. The authority to do so, always described as slight, is more accurately described as nonexistent. Today, we close the door.”

Also impacted by the Supreme Court ruling was the Torture Victim Protection Act (TVPA), which permits torture victims to sue perpetrators in American civil courts, irrespective of where the acts took place, provided the individuals were acting under the authority of a foreign nation.

The lower court ruled that individual Cisco executives could be personally liable under the separate TVPA statute for the same conduct, a ruling the Supreme Court reversed. The Justices found the TVPA “contains an express cause of action [and] does not provide for aiding-and-abetting liability.”

The Supreme Court’s liberal justices – Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson – argued that the majority ruling has effectively shut courthouse doors on victims of torture, forced labor, and even genocide with no real justification.

“As to each of these offenses, as to each of these enemies of mankind, the majority decides that there is simply no way that a suit could possibly proceed without offending Congress,” Justice Sotomayor's dissent reads. “Noticeably absent from the majority’s analysis is any evidence that Congress would be offended by these suits. Of course, there may be reasons why allowing an individual ATS suit to proceed would be unwise. That possibility, however, should be addressed on a case-by-case basis.”

Cisco Systems, Inc. v. Doe I arose following a 2011 lawsuit alleging Cisco’s compliance with the development of China's Golden Shield network. The case was dismissed in 2014, but subsequent appeals saw it weave its way before the Ninth Circuit.

An Associated Press (AP) report published last October claimed leaked Cisco marketing materials dated 2008 allegedly touted its products' ability to identify more than 90% of online content related to Falun Gong. The same report alleges Cisco adopted the language of the country's communist party, even quoting an official who referred to the group as an “evil cult,” a moniker the Chinese government uses.

The vendor has repeatedly denied the accusations, with former chief legal officer Mark Chandler writing that same year: “Cisco does not supply equipment to China that is customized in any way to facilitate blocking of access or surveillance of users. Equipment supplied to China is the same equipment we provide worldwide.”

The networking giant petitioned the Supreme Court following the Ninth Circuit ruling, contending that federal courts should not be permitted to create “aiding and abetting” liability under either statute without explicit congressional authorization, and that it merely sold standard networking equipment to Chinese government agencies in lawful commerce – sales that were deemed permissible under U.S. law at the time.

Subsequent crackdowns on Falun Gong followers have since seen dissidents flee, with some going on to the U.S. to found the Epoch Times, a pro-Trump, anti-Chinese Communist party, right-leaning media outlet. A nonprofit founded by expatriate Falun Gong practitioners is also behind Shen Yun, the series of symphonic music and dance shows that take place around the world.