Christina Spicer  |  October 10, 2018

Category: Consumer News

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Consumers have hit Google and its parent company, Alphabet Inc., with a class action lawsuit after the company announced a “bug” had gotten into its social media platform Google Plus, exposing the information of up to 500,000 users.

Lead plaintiffs, Matt Matic and Zak Harris, allege in the Google Plus class action lawsuit that the search engine’s try at a social media network ended up exposing users to a data leak.

The plaintiffs say that, as recently announced by Google, third parties that were permitted access to Google Plus user information were infected with a “bug” that exposed user information. The plaintiffs say that Google compounded the issue by failing to disclose the breach for at least seven months.

“This case involves the data leak Google and Alphabet announced on October 8, 2018, wherein the Personal Information of up to 500,000 users was exposed due to a software glitch that gave third-party application developers access to private Google+ profile data between 2015 and March 2018,” states the Google Plus class action lawsuit.

The plaintiffs, residents of California and Florida, say that they are both Google Plus users. They allege that the personal information they entrusted to Google when joining the social media site was exposed in the breach.

According to the Google class action lawsuit, the plaintiffs, as well as other Google Plus users were assured by the company that they would have control over access to information they provided to the social media network.

“Despite these representations, Google’s lax approach to data security resulted in a data leak affecting more than 500,000 Google+ users over a period of at least 3 years,” the Google class action lawsuit contends.

According to an Oct. 8, 2018 announcement by Alphabet, Google Plus, considered an attempt by the company to compete with Facebook, is slated to shut down within the year.

Additionally, points out the Google Plus class action lawsuit, the parent company of Google admitted that a “software glitch” had allowed third parties to access private user information between 2015 and March 2018.

“Given that Google+ was launched to challenge Facebook, the recent data security incidents suffered by Facebook users should have made Defendants more sensitive to the necessary protection of Google+ users’ data,” states the Google Plus class action lawsuit. “Instead, Defendants allowed this vulnerability in its system to endure for nearly 3 years, all the while leaking private information to unauthorized third parties.”

In addition to failing to announce the breach for an extended period, the Google Plus class action lawsuit alleges that Google has underestimated the number of users who have been affected by the breach.

“Although Defendants have reported that only up to 500,000 users were affected, the reality is that this number is what was determined only for the two week period prior to the discovery of the security vulnerability in March 2018. Thus, given that the data leak occurred for nearly 3 years, the number of compromised users is expected to be much higher,” points out the Google class action lawsuit.

The Google Plus class action lawsuit seeks to represent a nationwide Class of those who registered for Google Plus accounts, along with a California subclass, whose data was compromised in the alleged data breach.

The plaintiffs are seeking damages as well as a court order requiring Google to provide credit monitoring services to affected Google Plus users.

The lead plaintiffs are represented by Joshua H. Watson and Clayeo C. Arnold of Clayeo C. Arnold APLC, and John A. Yanchunis, Jean Martin and Ryan McGee of Morgan & Morgan Complex Litigation Group.

The Google Plus Data Breach Class Action Lawsuit is Matic, et al. v. Google Inc. and Alphabet Inc., Case No. 5:18-cv-06164-EJD, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.

UPDATE: On Jan. 6, 2020, Google agreed to pay $7.5 million to settle claims arising from a data breach in its Google+ platform that potentially exposed users’ profile information to third-parties.

UPDATE 2: August 2020, the Google Plus account class action settlement is now open. Click here to file a claim.

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