If you have had your personal information impacted by the American Financial Resources data breach, contact a data privacy attorney to investigate your claim. You may be able to file a class action data breach lawsuit to compensate you for your time, financial losses, and future risk of identity theft.
After American Financial Resources (AFR) detected unusual activity on its networks, a data breach investigation determined that certain American Financial Resources files were accessed without authorization in December 2021. AFR concluded on February 4, 2022 that thousands of client files may have been stolen.
Based on the American Financial Resources investigation, the unauthorized party may have accessed the following personal data:
Security and data breaches are an issue plaguing dozens of companies that store customers’ personal information online. Several high-profile security breach incidents have drawn security negligence into question, and attorneys and victims are holding the responsible parties accountable for leaked financial information, credit scores, credit card numbers, bank information and other confidential information.
Security breach settlements have recovered millions of dollars for victims. If you have been a victim of a security breach, contact a data breach lawyer to discuss the possible legal recourse and litigation process.
Joe Lyon is a highly-rated personal data breach lawyer and Privacy Attorney representing plaintiffs nationwide in class action security breach lawsuits.
Regardless of the reason for a security breach—whether a person or group gains access to confidential information for financial or political gain—victims have the right to file a claim against a company for failing to protect their information, and can lead to a class action lawsuit.
Companies must exercise reasonable care in protecting customers’ information, and if they do not, they can be held liable for the damages that result, including identity theft.
Security breach victims and attorneys representing plaintiffs have been able to settle multi-million dollar recoveries. If you or a loved one suffered financial losses from a data breach, contact a data breach lawyer for a free consultation.
An experienced class action attorney can determine if you are eligible to file a data breach lawsuit or join a class of plaintiffs. A lawyer can assist in determining the following:
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ABOUT THE LYON FIRM
Joseph Lyon has 17 years of experience representing individuals in complex litigation matters. He has represented individuals in every state against many of the largest companies in the world.
The Firm focuses on single-event civil cases and class actions involving corporate neglect & fraud, toxic exposure, product defects & recalls, medical malpractice, and invasion of privacy.
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The Firm offers contingency fees, advancing all costs of the litigation, and accepting the full financial risk, allowing our clients full access to the legal system while reducing the financial stress while they focus on their healthcare and financial needs.
Without data breach class actions, large corporate defendants would be able to cause small amounts of harm over a large group of individuals without any risk of monetary penalty.
Holding companies accountable for poor cybersecurity and data theft incidents helps ensure that consumers are better protected in the future.
Yes, in most cases. However, each case is different, but some recent lawsuits have proven to be quite valuable. In one data breach suit, Ohio Attorney General and attorneys general in other states obtained a $17.5 million settlement against The Home Depot due to a data breach in 2014. The settlement resolves a multistate data breach which exposed the payment card information of approximately 40 million Home Depot consumers.
The Home Depot data breach made vulnerable the company’s self-checkout point-of-sale system. In addition to the $17.5 million settlement, The Home Depot has agreed to improve network security and maintain data security practices in order to strengthen its data security program and protect the personal information of consumers.
Under current privacy law the firm or organization that is storing user data are responsible for data breaches and will pay any fines or damages that are the result of legal action. The actual data holder—an organization that provides cloud storage—is not usually legally implicated or held responsible in litigation.
The majority of data breach incidents are accidental, and not actually hacking events. Outside threats do pose personal data risks for consumers, though the bigger risk is the internal security and cloud-based data network. Some common ways data can be compromised include:
Privacy laws are meant to protect patients’ personal health data, and when institutions fail to protect personal data they may be sued for damages. In recent years much health data has been leaked and stolen, causing significant damages to plaintiffs who have have taken legal action.
In a recent case the American Medical Collection Agency (AMCA) settled with nearly 21 million people in 40 states and Washington D.C. concerning a data breach that may have exposed their personal information. The breach, which occurred in 2018, lasted nearly a year until official notice of the intrusion.
An unauthorized user gained access to the AMCA internal data system and collected the personal information, including Social Security numbers, financial information, and personal health information, such as medical tests and diagnostic codes.
Quest Diagnostics was alerted that the hack exposed the personal medical data of 11.9 million of its patients. LabCorp had 7.7 million patients exposed. A number of class action lawsuits were filed throughout the country, alleging negligence, breach of contract, and a variety privacy violations concerning data security.
A Class Action is a lawsuit brought by an individual on behalf of all other similarly situated individuals. Rule 23 of the Federal and State Rules of Civil Procedure allows for Class Action lawsuits to resolve disputes in an efficient format.
Class Actions are typically filed when the amount of money in dispute for a single plaintiff would not justify litigating the case, but where the amount of damages of the entire class of Plaintiffs would justify the cost of litigation. Without class actions, large corporate defendants would be able to cause small amounts of harm over a large group of individuals without any risk of monetary penalty.
In order for a case to be certified as a Class Action, the Court must determine that the case is appropriate for class action treatment under Rule 23. There are different elements depending on whether the case is seeking monetary or injunctive relief. In general, the Court must find the following elements are satisfied:
Following a data breach incident, or receiving a data breach notification letter, victims should consider talking to a legal expert, and move quickly to take the following steps to help prevent identity theft and fraud:
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