Thompson Consumer Law Group and the Law Offices of Andrew J Brown announce what is believed to be the largest verdict ever obtained for consumers under the Fair Credit Reporting Act.
After a 4-day trial, a federal jury awarded a class of consumers more than $140 million in damages against Lumen Inc (formerly CenturyLink, Inc.) for violating consumers’ privacy by obtaining their credit reports without a legal basis.
The case was brought under the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) which protects consumers by making it illegal for companies to access a consumer’s credit report unless they have one of the stated reasons under the FCRA.
In a resounding win for consumers, Lumen Inc. was ordered by the jury to pay each class member $2,500 for violating their privacy rights. “We fight every day to protect consumers, and their most personal financial and private information,” said Russell S. Thompson, IV, one of the two trial lawyers who brought the case. “This should serve as a warning to other companies who play fast and loose with people’s privacy,” he added.
The facts that came out at trial showed that Lumen’s website was intentionally designed to surreptitiously obtain credit reports of consumers regardless of whether they actually ordered services from the company. Consumers who visited the website to check available services and pricing were never told that their credit reports were being obtained by the company, and only learned about it later if they were notified by a credit monitoring service, or actually checked their credit reports and discovered the hard pull on their report.
“Congress chose to put consumers in control of how and when their sensitive financial data is used and shared,” explained Andrew Brown, co-counsel for the plaintiffs. “The jury here made clear that companies don’t have free reign to pull credit reports because consumers are window shopping or comparing prices. They must actually have one of the lawful reasons identified by Congress.”
The case is Bultemeyer v. CenturyLink, Inc., Case No. 2:14-cv-02530-SPL (D. Ariz.)
