Nationwide Insurance Hack Class Action Lawsuit

Top Class Actions’s website and social media posts use affiliate links. If you make a purchase using such links, we may receive a commission, but it will not result in any additional charges to you. Please review our Affiliate Link Disclosure for more information.

Nationwide Mutual Insurance Co. has been hit with a class action lawsuit over an October 3 cyber-attack that exposed the personal information nearly 1 million consumers who requested insurance quotes from the company.

Plaintiff Anthony Hancox alleges in the Nationwide hack class action lawsuit that the company failed to follow basic security protocols and allowed hackers to easily access consumers’ names and Social Security numbers. Hackers were also able to obtain consumers’ genders, occupations and the names and addresses of their employers.

“Defendant flagrantly disregarded plaintiff’s and the other Class Members’ privacy and property rights by intentionally, willfully and recklessly failing to take the necessary precautions required to safeguard and protect plaintiff’s and the other class members’ [personally identifiable information] from unauthorized disclosure,” the Nationwide class action lawsuit states.

To make matters worse, Nationwide did not inform Hancox and other affected consumers about the data breach until six weeks after it occurred, the class action lawsuit states. Nationwide provided directions on how to freeze credit reports to prevent criminals from taking out loans but did not offer to pay the fees associated with this measure. Nationwide did, however, provide one year of free credit monitoring and identity theft protection.

The class action lawsuit says consumers who had their sensitive data exposed are about 9.5 times more likely to suffer identity fraud. They are also at risk of having their information sold to companies carrying out targeted marketing campaign and health insurers looking to monitor customers’ medical conditions so they can adjust premiums.

The full extent of the harm consumers may suffer from the October Nationwide cyber hack is still unknown, Hancox adds.

“[T]here is a high likelihood that significant identity fraud and/or identity theft has not yet been discovered or reported, and a high probability that criminals who may now possess plaintiff’s and the other class members’ [personally identifiable information] and not yet used the information will do so at a later date or resell it,” the class action lawsuit states.

The Nationwide data theft class action lawsuit is brought on behalf of all persons who sought an insurance quote from Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company or Allied Insurance Company and had their personal information compromised by the October 3, 2012 data breach.

It is seeking damages and injunctive relief for violating the Fair Credit Reporting Act, negligence, invasion of privacy through public disclosure of private facts, and failure to safeguard information that consumers entrusted to Nationwide.

The Nationwide Insurance Data Theft Class Action Lawsuit case is Anthony Hancox et al. v. Nationwide Mutual Insurance Co., Case No. 13-cv-02047, U.S. District Court for the District of Kansas.

The plaintiffs are represented by Mitchell Burgess of Burgess & Lamb PC, Ralph K. Phalen Law PC, Ben Barnow of Barnow & Associates PC, Richard L. Coffman of The Coffman Law Firm, and Cory Fein of Caddell & Chapman PC.

UPDATE: A federal judge dismissed this class action lawsuit on Feb. 10, 2014, ruling the plaintiff failed to show he had been harmed by the Nationwide Insurance data breach.

All class action and lawsuit news updates are listed in the Lawsuit News section of Top Class Actions