Class Action Blog

The Supreme Court of Illinois ruled that the Rosenbach class action suit could proceed after finding that the plaintiff was an “aggrieved person” entitled to “seek liquidated damages and injunctive relief” for violations of the Biometric Information Privacy Act (Act) (740 ILCS 14/1 et seq.) without also alleging “some actual injury or adverse effect, beyond violation of his or her rights under the statute.” The court was not particularly concerned whether it was following the Supreme Court’s holding in Spokeo since the Illinois high court was addressing an Illinois statute. 

Several putative class action lawsuits were filed as the result of a January 2012 hack attack on online retailer Zappos.com, Inc.’s servers. The hack allowed the theft of personal identifying information (“PII”) of more than 24 million Zappos customers. There was an MDL set up in the District of Nevada to handle pretrial proceedings. Zappos filed a motion to dismiss the third amended consolidated complaint and a motion to strike the class allegations. The Court grouped the various plaintiffs into (1) those who alleged that they had financial losses from identity theft; and (2) those named in earlier complaints who did not allege having financial losses from identity theft. The District Court ruled that the group alleging they already had financial losses had Article III standing.