Sony Pictures Hit with 2 More Data Hack Class Action Lawsuits

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Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc. has been hit with two more class action lawsuits filed by former employees whose personal information was compromised during a massive hack that was reportedly initiated in response to the movie studio’s production of the controversial film “The Interview.” The plaintiffs allege Sony failed to protect its current and former employees’ confidential information.

On Tuesday, plaintiffs Susan Dukow and Yvonne Yaconelli filed their Sony hack class action lawsuit in California superior court in Los Angeles. They allege that “as a result of Sony’s inadequate data security,” the names, addresses, Social Security numbers, employment records, medical history and financial information of more than 47,000 current and former Sony employees and associates have been accessed and publicized by unauthorized individuals.

Plaintiffs Joshua Forster and Ella Carline Archibeque filed their Sony hack class action lawsuit in California federal court on Wednesday. Due to the data hack, they claim that Sony employees’ records have been published on file-sharing websites for identity thieves to access. Further, they claim the information has been used to send threatening emails to employees.

“Cybercriminals were able to perpetuate a breach of this depth and scope because [Sony] failed to maintain reasonable and adequate security measures to protect the employees’ information from access and disclosure,” Forster and Archibeque allege in the Sony hack class action lawsuit. Further, they allege that Sony failed to inform them about the breach for a week, leaving them vulnerable to identify theft, tax fraud and financial theft.

“Since the breach [Sony] has focused its remediation efforts on securing its intellectual property from pirates and a public relations campaign directed at controlling the damage associated with the release of embarrassing internal emails” instead of working to inform and protect its employees from the damage caused by the hack, according to Forster and Archibeque’s class action lawsuit.

“The Interview,” starring James Franco and Seth Rogan, is a fictional account of an American talk show host who attempts to kill North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. “Sony knew the risks and repercussions associated with releasing the film,” Dukow and Yaconelli say in their data breach class action lawsuit. “Sony received multiple warnings that retribution for releasing the film was inevitable. Sony moved forward with the film, knowing that by doing so, it created an unreasonable risk for Plaintiffs and Class Members.”

The Sony hack class action lawsuits seek to represent a Class of current and former employees or associates of Sony whose personally identifiable information was compromised as a result of the November 2014 data breach.

The first Sony hack class action lawsuit was filed on Monday.

Dukow and Yaconelli are represented by Douglas L. Johnson, Neville L. Johnson and Brian T. Shippen-Murray of Johnson & Johnson LLP.

Forster and Archibeque are represented by Daniel C. Girard and Matthew B. George of Girard Gibbs LLP.

The Sony Pictures Data Hack Class Action Lawsuits are Joshua Forster and Ella Carline Archibeque v. Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc., Case No. 2:14-cv-09646 in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California; and Susan Dukow and Yvonne Yaconelli v. Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc., Case No. BC566884, in the Superior Court for the State of California, County of Los Angeles.