Home Depot faces data breach lawsuit, tries for dismissal

Home supply juggernaut Home Depot is currently in the process of requesting a dismissal of a consumer data breach lawsuit. The lawsuit, filed on May 1, alleges that Home Depot's "overarching complacency" over its digital security led to the credit card information of over 56 million customers being leaked to hackers back in September of 2014. In a May 27 complaint, several financial institutions went on record claiming that the cost from the incident of canceling and reissuing cards alone totaled over $150 million and that the total damages caused are in the billions.

At the center of the complaint is a quote from Frank Blake, the recently retired CEO of Home Depot, in which he said, "If we rewind the tape, our security systems could have been better…Data security just wasn't high enough in our mission statement."

On June 1, Home Depot requested that the consumer suit be dismissed, claiming that everyone who had been injured by it had already been compensated, that "none of the plantiffs' purported injuries are traceable to Home Depot's conduct," and that the plaintiffs have been unable to identify "and deceptive act by Home Depot and do not allege any actual damage flowing from Home Depot's purported delay in providing notice." Home Depot has yet to respond to the financial institutions' second lawsuit. Both cases are set to be tried in the U.S. District Court in Atlanta and presided over by Judge Thomas W. Thrash.

A data breach is a serious problem. It can cost a great deal of time and money to recover from, and it can cause significant damage to your client relationships. If your systems have recently been compromised, you should contact an experienced business lawyer as soon as possible. 

Categorised in: Business Law, Litigation

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