October 10, 2024
A San Francisco federal judge Wednesday preliminarily approved Thomson Reuters’ $27.5 million deal to settle a certified class action alleging that the information conglomerate violated the privacy rights of 40 million Californians by secretly collecting their data to sell “cradle-to-grave dossiers.”
U.S. District Judge Edward M. Chen told the parties during a hearing held in San Francisco that he considered the settlement to be fair and the fees “at first look” to be “within a reasonable range.”
The case brought by two San Francisco Bay Area residents focused on a data collecting software product called Clear that Thomson Reuters sells to law enforcement and businesses.
“At no time has Thomson Reuters sought consent from class members before appropriating and selling their personal data through its Clear products, nor does it have a process for doing so,” the suit said. “The class members received no compensation for Thomson Reuters’ use of their identities.”
As part of the deal, Thomson Reuters agreed to establish a nonreversionary $27.5 million fund from which payments will be made to Californians who submit a claim. The fund also covers the cost of the plaintiffs’ court-approved expenses and attorney fees.
Thomson Reuters will take several steps under the settlement that will give California residents more control over the information available about them through Clear, and those changes will be required for four years, according to the motion for preliminary approval. First the company will create and maintain a website for California residents to learn about Clear, including “the types of customers who use it, and the types of data available through it.”
Thomson Reuters will also no longer require California residents to provide a driver’s license to remove certain data from Clear. The company will also forward direct data removal requests from California to its “network of data suppliers so that they too can remove information from the sources that supply Clear,” the motion said.
Under the settlement, Thomson Reuters pledged to also make Clear’s default settings more “privacy protective,” including changing a default setting that provided information available about “relatives, associates, licensed drivers, property owners, and neighbors of the report subject.”
These changes will take place within six months of final approval of the settlement and be in place for four years, according to the preliminary approval motion, filed with the court on Aug. 29.
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Plaintiffs and the class are represented by Andre M. Mura and Ezekiel S. Wald of Gibbs Law Group LLP and Geoffrey A. Graber and Karina G. Puttieva of Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll PLLC.
Read Thomson Reuters Gets Initial OK on $27.5M Privacy Suit Deal.