Class Actions Mount Following Massive Data Breach

Internet giant Yahoo is facing mounting lawsuits following a massive data breach. Read More.

One of the Internet’s oldest email services, Yahoo has more than one billion monthly users.

Last month, Yahoo announced it had been the victim of 2014 breach in which at least 500 million Yahoo accounts were stolen from the company in  an unprecedented  hack – possibly by a state-sponsored actor. Among the data retrieved: names, email addresses, telephone numbers, dates of birth, and in some cases, encrypted or unencrypted security questions and answers.

CaseyGerry recently announced it had  filed a class action lawsuit  against Sunnyvale, Calif.-based Yahoo – alleging that the company put users at risk for identity theft and failed to notify them in a timely fashion about the unprecedented hack. Read More.

The suit, filed in the U.S. District Court in San Diego on behalf of San Diego residents Jennifer J. Myers and Paul Dugas, also alleges deception, negligence, misrepresentation and invasion of privacy on the part of Yahoo.

According to firm partner David S. Casey, Jr., the lawsuit seeks damages resulting from Yahoo’s failure to securely store and maintain highly personal data. “We believe the company failed to properly safeguard sensitive private information. In addition, it took the company two years to reveal the hack – a huge problem, as the longer a breach goes undisclosed the greater the harm to individuals,” Casey Jr. said. “Also concerning is the fact this data breach occurred at all. A sophisticated, multinational company like Yahoo certainly should have the state-of-the-art systems in place necessary to avoid this type of hacking.”

The hack – believed to be one of the largest cyber security breaches in history – was damaging on many levels, Casey Jr. said. “In addition to compromising existing accounts, the class members’ personal information can be used by identity thieves to open new financial accounts, incur charges in the name of class members, take out loans, clone credit and debit cards and other unauthorized activities. This highly sensitive information can also be used to blackmail or embarrass class members in person or online.”

“There’s a sense of violation,” he added. “We think many more class actions will be filed and consolidated into one federal class action suit.” Read More.