A client recently asked me to identify the next wave of data privacy litigation. I said that with so much attention on lawsuits arising from data breaches, particularly in light of some recent successes for the plaintiffs in those lawsuits, the way in which companies collect information and disclose what they are collecting is flying
Lawsuits
Yet Another Potential Multimillion-Dollar Data Breach Settlement . . .
Just when you thought it might be safe to go back into the water, another significant data breach lawsuit may be settling. Last week, I wrote about the proposed settlement in the AvMed lawsuit. The motion for a preliminary proposed settlement in that case was granted on Friday, and a Final Hearing is set for…
$3,000,000 Settlement Reached in Data Breach Lawsuit
How much of a headache can a couple of stolen laptops cause your organization? How about a $3 million headache?? That is the amount of a settlement proposed in an Unopposed Motion in Support of Preliminary Approval of Class Action Settlement in Resnick/Curry v. AvMed, Inc., No. 1:10-cv-24513-JLK (S.D. Fla.), a data breach lawsuit…
Data Breach Lawsuits Settling in the Southern District of Florida
Plaintiffs in data breach lawsuits around the country have had a difficult time surviving motions to dismiss and for summary judgment. A number of courts have rejected these lawsuits because they failed to allege or demonstrate cognizable injuries, standing, causation, and the requisite elements to withstand an economic loss rule defense. It is dangerous, however,…
Healthcare Organizations Take It On The Chin
If you have noticed an increasing number of high profile problems for healthcare organizations with respect to privacy and security issues these last few weeks you’re not alone. The issues have ranged from employee misuse of protected health information, web-based breaches, photocopier breaches, and theft of stolen computers that compromised millions of records containing unsecured…
Data Breach Lawsuits – Revisiting the Risks
Until recently, individuals whose information was compromised as a result of a company suffering a data breach faced an uphill battle when suing the company in a class action lawsuit. Far more often than not, Courts dismissed the lawsuits or entered summary judgment in favor of defendants on grounds that the plaintiffs could not establish…
New U.S. Supreme Court Decision Will Likely Impact Data Breach Litigation
The following Data Security Law Journal post was authored by Becky Schwartz, my law partner at Shook Hardy & Bacon. Becky is an experienced class action litigator who has developed a specialty in privacy litigation. In this post, Becky discusses a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision that may make it more difficult for consumers …
Identity Theft –Who Is A Victim?
Are you a victim of identity theft when your personally identifiable information is stolen? Is the theft alone, and the risk that your information may be misused, sufficient? Does your information have to be misused in some fraudulent manner before you can be considered a victim?
A federal appellate court recently weighed in on these…
Where Can You Be Sued For Using A Computer?
It is sometimes easy to forget with the increasing mobility of electronic information and our ability to “work from anywhere” that behind our office laptop, desktop, or tablet computing device is a network of servers that may be located anywhere in the world. When we hit “send”, “save”, or “open”, we use the network to…
The Southern District of Florida Weighs In On Data Breach Lawsuits
Late last week, another Federal District Court (the Southern District of Florida) weighed in on the circumstances under which a plaintiff may sue a breached entity civilly for damages when the plaintiff’s personally identifiable information (PII) is inappropriately accessed or acquired. The Court allowed the case to proceed with counts for violation of Florida’s Unfair…