Target Seeks to Consolidate 100 Data Breach Class Action Lawsuits

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UPDATE 1: A federal judge has set a number of key dates in the Target Data Breach MDL, including an April 1, 2016 deadline to have the consolidated class action lawsuit ready for trial.

UPDATE 2: A federal judge has preliminarily approved a $10 million class action settlement. Details on how to file a claim for the Target data breach settlement can be found here.

UPDATE 3: The Target data breach class action settlement received final approval on Nov. 17, 2015.

UPDATE 4: On Jan. 27, 2016, an objection to the $10 million Target data breach class action lawsuit settlement deal was dismissed by the 8th Circuit on appeal.

UPDATE 5: On Feb. 1, 2017, the Eighth Circuit Court of appeals reversed the class certification and directed the district court to make a new ruling and explain its findings. According to the settlement website, claims will not be paid until class certification is resolved. This could take several more months. Please keep checking Top Class Actions for updates. We are following the case and will let our viewers know as soon as the class certification decision is made!

UPDATE 6: On Aug. 22, 2019, Top Class Actions viewers started getting checks from the Target data breach class action settlement worth as much as $1,201.88. Congratulations to everyone who filed a claim and got PAID!

On Thursday, Target Corp. asked the U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation (JPML) to consolidate approximately 100 class action lawsuits that have been filed in the wake of the company’s massive data breach that took place during the 2013 holiday shopping season.

Target sought to have the class action lawsuits transferred to Minnesota federal court to streamline discovery and other pre-trial proceedings. The retailer argued that not only is Target headquartered in Minneapolis, Minn., but its technology department and many potential witnesses are located there. Further, according to Target’s attorneys, 24 of the class action lawsuits have already been assigned to U.S. District Judge Paul Magnuson, a Minnesota federal judge.

Following Target’s December 19 announcement that customer data had been stolen from credit and debit cards that were swiped in stores between November 27 and December 15, the retailer has been hit with a steady stream of class action lawsuits filed by consumers, banks and shareholders. As many as 70 million customers had personal information that was compromised during the Target data breach. This information may have included names, addresses, phone numbers and email addresses. Forty million customers may have also had their credit or debit card numbers stolen.

The class action lawsuits blame Target for the data breach, accusing the retailer of failing to protect customers’ financial data. The data that was allegedly exposed is known as “track data,” which allows criminals to create counterfeit payment cards by encoding the credit or debit card information onto any card with a magnetic strip.

Earlier this month, Umpqua Bank filed a class action lawsuit accusing Target of failing to protect customer data. It took issue with Target’s assurances to customers that they would not be responsible for any unauthorized charges on their payment cards stemming from the data breach. Umpqua argues that it is the financial institutions that are on the hook for any unauthorized charges—not Target. As a result of the Target data breach, Umpqua and numerous other financial institutions have incurred costs in an effort to protect their customers’ accounts. In the aftermath of the data breach, financial institutions were forced to provide notice to customers, reissue payment cards and refund fraudulent charges on credit and debit cards that were compromised.

A report by the U.S. Senate suggested Target missed “multiple warnings” that its customers’ personal and financial data could be vulnerable. According to the report, Target also made several missteps that put their customers’ data at risk. For example, the retailer allowed a third-party vendor to have network access, but the vendor allegedly relied on weak information security practices that may have allowed the hackers to access Target’s network.

The Senate report also found that Target failed to take action despite receiving multiple warnings that malware was being installed on their network, and that the retailer failed to properly isolate its most sensitive network assets from third-party vendors. Earlier this month, Target acknowledged that its security team had discovered signs of suspicious activity but failed to take immediate action.

The Target data breach is currently being investigated by the Federal Trade Commission, meaning the retailer could be faced with fines and ongoing regulatory scrutiny to prevent similar breaches in the future.

The Target Data Breach Class Action Lawsuit is In re: Target Corp. Customer Data Security Breach Litigation, MDL No. 2522, in the U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation.