Bose Must Face Spying Headphones Class Action Lawsuit

An Illinois federal judge has preserved some claims in a class action lawsuit alleging that Bose collects and shares listening histories from Bluetooth headphone users, while trashing other allegations.

According to U.S. District Court Judge Andrea Wood, claims that the company misled consumers about how the data would be used and shared holds up.

However, Judge Wood said that the consumers could not claim that Bose’s practice of collecting and sharing the data broke federal wiretapping law. She also threw out the claim that Bose’s actions violated the Illinois Eavesdropping Statute.

Judge Wood said that a company can only be in violation of the Federal Wiretapping Act and the Illinois Eavesdropping Statute if they are a third party to a communication.

The Bose Bluetooth headphone class action lawsuit was filed by Kyle Zak, who claimed that Bose collected and shared user listening information without their knowledge. He filed his Bose class action lawsuit in April 2017.

According to Zak, the company then shared this information with third parties in violation state and federal law.

Allegedly, Bose markets the Connect app in conjunction with its Bluetooth headphones as a way to connect to smartphones, so it would function much like a remote control.

Fighting back against the claim that Bose improperly collected and shared data, Bose notes that the app cannot access communications between an iPhone and Spotify because of protections placed on the apps by Apple.

Judge Wood preserved Zak’s argument that Bose misled consumers about how it used their data and shared it with Segment.io, a third-party data miner.

Allegedly, Segment.io uses the information to create profiles of listeners’ preferences. Zak claims that these actions violate Illinois’ Consumer Fraud and Deceptive Business Practices Act.

Judge Wood also preserved Zak’s claim that Bose unjustly enriched itself by collecting the data and misleading consumers about this practice.

Zak says that he would not have spent $350 on the Bose QuietComfort 35 wireless headphones he purchased had he known that his data would be collected and shared.

Bose fought back against these claims, arguing that it is permissible for them to not tell consumers that they are sharing the data.

However, Judge Wood disagreed saying that “Bose omitted the information because it knew consumers would not otherwise purchase the wireless products.”

Bose had previously made an argument that Zak could not invoke the Wiretap Act because the communication in question was between the app and the headphones.

Bose’s attorney argued that allowing Zak’s claims under the Wiretap Act to proceed “could make the standard operation of innumerable apps and devices illegal.”

Judge Wood did not address this, because she threw out the Wiretap Act claims. She stated that Bose was not a third party to the communications, which Zak himself had made clear, because the “app is a fully acknowledged participant in the communication of the media information — indeed, receiving and displaying the media information is a primary function of the app.”

Zak is represented by Jay Edelson, Benjamin S. Thomassen, and Rafey S. Balabanian of Edelson PC.

The Bose Bluetooth Headphones Information Sharing Class Action Lawsuit is Zak v. Bose Corp., et al., Case No. 1:17-cv-02928, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois.
UPDATE: On May 31, 2019,Bose asked an Illinois court to dismissa wiretap class action against them that claims the company collects consumer listening data.

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