A consumer has filed a putative class action against The Wendy’s Co. alleging a failure to sufficiently secure customer payment card data. Torres v. Wendy’s Co., No. 16-0210 (M.D. Fla., filed February 8, 2016). Wendy’s announced in late January 2016 that it had discovered in its processing systems a software program designed to steal credit and debit card information, several weeks after the plaintiff discovered that his debit card had been used in fraudulent purchases totaling almost $600. “Wendy’s could have prevented this Data Breach,” the complaint asserts. “The malicious software used in the Data Breach was more than likely a variant of ‘BlackPOS,’ the identical malware strain that hackers used in last year’s data breach at many other retail establishments. While many retailers, banks and card companies responded to recent breaches by adopting technology that helps make transactions more secure, Wendy’s has acknowledged that it has retained a security consultant to…
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The Manhattan Institute, a conservative think tank based in Washington, D.C., has published its annual survey of plaintiffs’ bar activities. Focusing on class action and mass tort litigation, the survey addresses consumer fraud allegations, labor and employment claims, and securities actions, among others, reporting that 29 percent of corporate counsel expect data privacy lawsuits “to grow more than any other class-action line of business.” Issue 592
An Arizona resident has filed a putative class action in an Illinois federal court claiming that Jimmy John’s Franchise, LLC failed to secure its customers’ personal and financial data, which were purportedly accessed through the company’s point-of-sale systems at some 216 restaurant locations, between June and September 2014. Irwin v. Jimmy John’s Franchise, LLC, No. 14-2275 (C.D. Ill., filed November 6, 2014). While the named plaintiff alleges that access to her credit card information led to “five fraudulent charges to the credit card that she used during the aforesaid transactions at Jimmy John’s,” she seeks to represent 39 separate statewide classes and a District of Columbia class of all those who used a debit or credit card at Jimmy John’s during the data breach regardless of whether they actually experienced a loss or identity theft. The plaintiff alleges that Jimmy John’s failed to promptly discover and block the data breach,…
P.F. Chang’s China Bistro Inc. is investigating a potential data breach that may have exposed thousands of customers’ credit and debit card data. After contacting banks to determine commonly visited locations, a cybersecurity blogger reported that the data of customers who visited P.F. Chang’s between March 2014 and May 19, 2014, has been offered for sale on an underground Website known for selling data resulting from the Target breach in late 2013. While the source of the potential breach remains unknown, experts suggest that thieves planted malware onto the point-of-sale systems that employees use to run customer’s credit cards because similar malware was used to steal credit and debit card information from other retailers. See USA Today, June 11, 2014. Issue 526
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