Time, Sports Illustrated Class Action Says Subscriber Info is Sold

A consumer class action lawsuit alleges that Time Inc. and Meredith Corporation sold magazine subscriber data, violating consumer privacy rights.

Plaintiff Christina Lachapelle says that she is a subscriber to Time and Sports Illustrated magazines, sold through Time Inc. and Meredith Corporation.

She alleges that the companies did not notify her before or at the time of buying her subscription that the company made a practice of disclosing the personal reading information of their customers.

The Time magazine class action lawsuit claims that Lachapelle never gave the companies authorization to do so. She says at no point was she notified that the companies “rent, exchange, or otherwise disclose their customers’ Personal Reading Information,” or was given a chance to opt out.

According to the Sports Illustrated class action lawsuit, Lachapelle and many other customers were similarly injured by the companies’ practices. The plaintiff seeks damages on behalf of herself and all other similarly affected consumers.

The Time, Sports Illustrated class action lawsuit claims that Lachapelle was financially injured by Time Inc. and Meredith Corporation’s actions because she says that what she received from her purchase of subscriptions (subscriptions without statutory privacy protections), was less valuable than what she paid for (subscriptions with privacy protections).

The plaintiff says that had she known that the company was going to sell her information, she would not have purchased the subscriptions at all, or would not have paid as much for them as she did.

The Time magazine personal reading information disclosure class action lawsuit says that because “Lachapelle is entitled by law to privacy in her Personal Reading Information, and because she paid money for her subscription, [the companies’] disclosure of her Personal Reading Information deprived [her] of the full set of benefits to which she was entitled as a part of her Time and Sports Illustrated subscriptions, thereby causing economic harm.”

Lachapelle claims that she was also injured by the companies’ practice of selling information because after her personal reading information was sold, she began receiving junk mail that provided no value to her, and was a nuisance.

Allegedly, Time Inc. and Meredith Corp. disclosed Lachapelle’s information with third party data aggregators and data cooperatives. These organizations allegedly then supplement the information given with their own files.

The Time subscriber info class action lawsuit alleges that the disclosure of personal information without an individual’s consent is unlawful, and goes on to say that it is “dangerous because it allows for the targeting of particularly vulnerable members of society.”

According to the Sports Illustrated subscriber class action lawsuit almost any organization could rent a list containing the names, addresses, and other personal information of people in any one particular demographic group, and target them in a number of ways.

The Time subscriber class action lawsuit goes on to say that Time Inc. and Meredith Corporation gain significant profit from the sale of the personal information of individuals, and “do so at the expense of their customers’ privacy and statutory rights.”

Lachapelle is represented by Peter N. Wasylyk of The Law Offices of Peter N. Wasylyk and by Scott A. Bursor, Joseph I. Marchese, and Philip L. Fraietta of Bursor & Fisher PA.

The Time, Sports Illustrated Magazine Subscriber Class Action Lawsuit is Christina Lachapelle v. Time Inc., et al., Case No. 1:18-cv-00535, in the U.S. District Court for the District of Rhode Island.