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Two Facebook users claim in a new antitrust class action lawsuit that the social media giant intentionally misleads the public about its data privacy protections to attract consumers and solidify the platform’s “utter domination” of the social media market.
Facebook promises to protect user data, but actually mines it for information about other social media outlets as part of an ongoing “copy, acquire or kill” campaign to rid it of any competition, the class action lawsuit claims. In so doing, the company essentially uses consumers’ information against them by eliminating free and fair competition and consumer choice, the plaintiffs’ legal team is arguing.
If not for Facebook’s antitrust practices, there would be more social media platforms to choose from, the class action lawsuit claims.
On those grounds, Facebook users Maximilian Klein of Vermont and Sarah Grabert of Illinois filed a class action lawsuit against Facebook in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California on Dec. 3. They claim Facebook has violated interstate trade and commerce laws and engaged in unjust enrichment.
They are seeking the Court’s approval of their lawsuit as a class action, granting Klein and Grabert the power to represent a nationwide Class of other Facebook users that could number in the tens of millions, at least.
“Facebook commands 2.47 billion daily active users and 3.14 billion monthly active users … [but] did not, as it would have the public believe, obtain market dominance based on innovation and fair competition,” the proposed class action lawsuit says. “Instead, Facebook has used its behemoth-status as a weapon to clear the field of any and all competitors that threaten to take away market share.”
The company’s claims to offer data privacy and protection to its users is the vehicle by which Facebook has attracted consumers, the class action lawsuit states. It was one of the deciding factors in both Klein and Grabert themselves choosing to join Facebook, they say.
Once on board, Facebook’s continuously evolving algorithms and analytics monitor that very user data for information about other social media platforms that might give it some competition, the class action lawsuit alleges.
“Equipped with the valuable user data it led consumers to believe it was not gathering and would not use in this way, Facebook targeted its users’ preferred alternatives for destruction,” the class action lawsuit states. “Facebook made clear that it would copy incipient competitors’ innovations and discriminatorily shut off these firms’ access to Facebook’s valuable user data if they did not sell their businesses to Facebook first.
“The message to its competitors was explicit: sell at a bargain, or Facebook will go into ‘destroy mode.’”
Facebook acquired the web analytics firm Onavo in 2013 and put the Israeli company to work analyzing Facebook’s trove of user private data, including records of usage of other applications, to identify possible competitors, the class action claims.
Klein and Grabert want the federal court to deem Facebook’s actions in violation of federal and California antitrust laws and to order it to stop its allegedly deceptive practices regarding data privacy.
They also want the court to require Facebook to hire a third-party auditor to evaluate the company’s “data privacy practices, commercial surveillance, and acquisition conduct” and to remedy any problems the auditors report.
Additionally they are asking the Court to order Facebook “to divest assets, such as WhatsApp, Instagram, and its Onavo technology, that tend to substantially entrench Facebook’s monopoly power in a timely and complete manner.”
Do you have a Facebook, Instagram or WhatsApp account? Were you attracted to the platform because the company led you to believe it offered the highest level of data privacy and protections? Tell us about it in the comment section below.
Lead plaintiffs Klein and Grabert and the proposed Class Members are represented by Adam B. Wolfson, Stephen A. Swedlow, Kevin Y. Teruya and Brantley I. Pepperman of Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan LLP and Warren Postman, Jason Ethridge, Ashley Keller and Benjamin Whiting of Keller Lenkner LLC.
The Facebook Data Privacy Class Action Lawsuit is Maximilian Klein, et al. v. Facebook Inc., Case No. 5:20-cv-08570, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, San Jose Division.
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80 thoughts onFacebook Users Say Platform Misleads on Data Privacy to Dominate the Market
Yes omg don’t get me started me and my daughter need to be added
Please add
Q: why do scammers hackers thieves prostitutes and criminals get away with it on Facebook?
A: because they can
Q; how many vulnerable adults are taken advantage of financially emotionally mentally spiritually on Facebook?
A: all of them
It is an absolute shame what Facebook gets away with in regards to their non-existent security I have had everything from prostitution to scams and hackers try to access me within 12 hours and I’m a vulnerable adult I feel so sad for the people who don’t know better it’s a terrible terrible thing that Mark Zuckerberg is getting away with in the fact that he has the power and the opportunity to fix it to change it to stop it but chooses to do nothing about it is a crime he has so much Global influence and instead of doing something to help humanity and help the planet and help his fellow mankind he turns a blind eye and hide in his money it’s his duty and responsibility to not allow these hackers scammers thieves Thugs and criminals into everyone’s lives I know they’ve got a pretty good disclaimer or whatever when you sign up but it doesn’t really mean a lot for a vulnerable adult a lot of us aren’t smart enough to decipher that thank God I was able to see it and I did not fall victim or pray to to these malicious attacks however my identity has been attempted to be hacked several times today it’s just even I can see many methods ways of forms they could use to implement that they could keep these scammers and hackers out of their platform but it’s quite obvious even to me that they simply choose not to because they don’t have to that in and of itself is illegal because they have this Monopoly please add me to this lawsuit thank you
please add me to this lawsuit.
Angela scott
Please add me to class action lawsuit,
I have been on Facebook and Instagram since they pretty much began. And the least few years I’ve been hit with so much spam from calls to text messages !!
I’ve been shutdown for stating my thoughts when others weren’t. And I’m nice I don’t curse about it.
I’ve reported many abuse things in animals and degrading females to teens half nude to bullying and it has all been left fo stating there was nothing found wrong.
I DO believe my personal rights and info has been exploited by what I receive and also bad charges on credit cards from sites.
PLEASE add me !
Add me to this!
add me please
Add me