DRI invites European victims of Facebook leak to join legal action against tech giant

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Donal O'Donovan Twitter Email

April 16 2021 06:03 AM

Digital Rights Ireland (DRI), a non governmental organisation (NGO) focused on privacy, is inviting European victims of a recent Facebook data leak to join a combined legal action against the tech giant seeking damages.

Director of DRI Antoin O’Lachtnain said he believes thousands of people may join the claim, which his group intends to pursue in the Irish courts.

The Facebook data leak involved 533 million peoples' user information including phone numbers and names being scrapped from its website and republished online.

People joining the action will have to contribute to the costs of the case, he said. He said that is likely to be a fixed amount donated to DRI. He said he does not believe individual doners would be on the hook for costs if the litigation fails or if Facebook was to win but said they will be in line for damages if the case succeeds.

He said it was too early to say how much each person joining the claim will have to pay, or when the action will go ahead.

Whether the action goes ahead is dependent on the number of people who join, he said.

Solicitor Simon McGarr is advising DRI.

The chair of DRI Dr TJ McIntyre said seeking damages was the best way to force a company to change behaviour.

“DRI is calling on EU residents to join us in taking action against Facebook for monetary damages. Forcing companies like Facebook to pay money to users whose privacy rights they’ve violated is the most effective way to really change the behaviour of these big tech companies."