As previously noted in this blog, the Neiman Marcus payment card data theft class action reflects a lenient approach to the issue of standing in data breach cases. In that case, the Seventh Circuit rejected arguments that...more
A challenge to the use of a cy pres charitable donations to settle privacy claims against Google will be heard by the Supreme Court. In Frank v. Gaos, petitioners seek reversal of lower court decisions rejecting their...more
This week’s disclosure that a 2013 data breach may have affected all 3 billion Yahoo accounts then in existence could alter the scope of the consolidated data breach cases currently pending against Yahoo in the federal court...more
When hackers steal consumer data, injury to consumers is not a foregone conclusion. This is particularly so where credit and debit card numbers are stolen. Banks, not consumers, bear the cost of fraudulent charges. ...more
In an important victory for employers, the Supreme Court in Spokeo, Inc. v. Robins held that a plaintiff does not have Article III standing to sue in federal court under the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) and other federal...more
6/3/2016
/ Article III ,
Background Checks ,
Class Action ,
Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) ,
Hiring & Firing ,
Injury-in-Fact ,
Job Applicants ,
SCOTUS ,
Spokeo ,
Spokeo v Robins ,
Standing ,
Statutory Damages
Court holds that plaintiff must allege a concrete injury to have standing to sue for a statutory violation; remands for further proceedings -
In its just-issued decision in Spokeo, Inc. v. Robins, No. 13-1339, slip op....more
Trends & Analysis -
..We have identified 42 health care–related qui tam cases that have been unsealed in whole or in part since the cases covered in our last Qui Tam Update. Included in that count is one proceeding (the...more
Everyone loves a good courtroom drama. So just imagine this pitch: henchmen of an evil dictator hack their way into a movie studio computer system. Once inside, they steal the most sensitive personal information of the...more
The United States Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that Tyson Foods employees could use representative evidence to establish liability and damages for class certification purposes. The opinion gives the plaintiffs’ class action...more
3/26/2016
/ Admissible Evidence ,
Calculation of Damages ,
Class Action ,
Class Certification ,
Class Members ,
Doffing ,
Donning ,
Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) ,
SCOTUS ,
Statistical Sampling ,
Tyson Foods v Bouaphakeo ,
Unpaid Overtime ,
Wage and Hour
Last week, a federal court in Atlanta issued an order preliminarily approving a proposed settlement – valued up to $19.5 million – of the consumer claims arising from the 2014 theft of payment card data from Home Depot. The...more
Last month, we wrote about the Supreme Court’s opinion in Campbell-Ewald Co. v. Gomez, in which the Court ruled that “an unaccepted Rule 68 Offer of Judgment for complete relief does not moot a plaintiff’s individual and...more
Two years after the massive holiday season theft of customers’ payment card data from Target point of sale terminals, the Target data breach litigation appears to be entering its final act. On Tuesday, December 1, Target...more
As reported on Friday in the Krebs on Security blog, online broker Scottrade had sent an e-mail to customers earlier that day stating that it recently had learned from law enforcement officials that Scottrade was one of a...more
10/8/2015
/ Class Action ,
Credit Monitoring ,
Cyber Crimes ,
Cybertheft ,
Data Breach ,
Data Privacy ,
Data Security ,
Financial Institutions ,
Government Investigations ,
Law Enforcement ,
Personal Data ,
Scottrade ,
Standard of Care
This Is The End? -
Settlement appears imminent in an employee class action against Sony Pictures Entertainment (“SPE”) arising from disclosure of their personally identifiable information (“PII”) in a massive data breach...more
9/8/2015
/ Class Action ,
Class Certification ,
Credit Monitoring ,
Cybersecurity ,
Data Breach ,
Data Privacy ,
Data Security ,
Employee Privacy Rights ,
Free Identity Theft Protection ,
Hackers ,
Identity Theft ,
Personally Identifiable Information ,
Settlement ,
Sony ,
Stipulations
Card-issuing banks are forging ahead with their lawsuit against Target arising from the 2013 holiday shopping season data breach. Their July 1 motion for class certification has just been unsealed, allowing a glimpse at...more
8/26/2015
/ Class Action ,
Class Certification ,
Credit Cards ,
Cybersecurity ,
Data Breach ,
Data Protection ,
Data Security ,
MasterCard ,
Personally Identifiable Information ,
Settlement Agreements ,
Target ,
Visa Inc
A Seventh Circuit panel recently overruled its own precedent to hold that a defendant’s offer of full compensation in an offer of judgment under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 68 does not moot the litigation. While the...more
Seventh Circuit Rules Consumers Have Standing to Sue in Neiman Marcus Payment Card Data Breach Case -
In Remijas v. Neiman Marcus Group, LLC, the Seventh Circuit reversed a district court decision dismissing consumer...more
7/22/2015
/ Appeals ,
Article III ,
Clapper v. Amnesty International ,
Class Action ,
Data Breach ,
Debit and Credit Card Transactions ,
Imminent Harm ,
Neiman Marcus ,
Retailers ,
Spokeo v Robins ,
Standing
Home Depot has staked its defense of consumer claims arising from the 2014 theft of payment card data from the home improvement retailer on the asserted absence of injuries sufficient to confer standing to sue. Because...more
6/4/2015
/ Article III ,
Class Action ,
Corporate Counsel ,
Cybersecurity ,
Data Breach ,
Data Protection ,
Home Depot ,
Jurisdiction ,
Popular ,
Standing ,
Target
On March 18, 2015 – just three months after denial of a motion to dismiss consumer claims arising from Target’s 2013 data breach – Target and the consumer class filed papers seeking approval of a settlement. The proposed...more
The Second Circuit Court of Appeals has released its much-anticipated decision in Roach v. T.L Cannon Corp., addressing the Supreme Court’s Comcast Corp. v. Behrend decision in connection with a wage and hour class action...more
A recent ruling by Federal District Judge Paul Magnuson will permit most of the consumer claims in the Target data breach litigation to survive Target’s motion to dismiss. This most recent ruling follows on the heels of the...more
The latest salvo in the Target data breach litigation is a class action brought by credit card issuing banks advancing a creative and somewhat misleading construction of the Minnesota’s Plastic Card Security Act. The banks...more
In the latest chapter in the Sony PlayStation Network (“PSN”) data breach saga, a decision that issued on January 21, 2014 permanently dismissed all but a handful of the class action claims advanced in a 51 count complaint. ...more
. . . a data breach class action.
Hackers and plaintiffs’ lawyers could combine to make 2014 the year when class actions concerning theft of sensitive information proliferate. On this 11th Day of Privacy, we look...more
12/24/2013
/ Class Action ,
Credit Cards ,
Cybersecurity ,
Cybertheft ,
Data Breach ,
Data Protection ,
Data Theft ,
Financial Crimes ,
Hackers ,
Identity Theft ,
Retailers ,
Risk Management ,
Security and Privacy Controls ,
Target ,
Vendors
In an abrupt but not unexpected reversal, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court (SJC) has been forced to change its position on class action waivers in arbitration agreements in light of a new decision by the U.S. Supreme...more