NEW YORK, Sept. 23, 2016 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Labaton Sucharow LLP and Robbins Geller Rudman & Dowd LLP jointly filed a class action today against Yahoo! Inc. (Yahoo) (NASDAQ:YHOO) concerning an unprecedented breach of the tech giant’s security affecting approximately 500 million users.
In a statement released yesterday, September 22, 2016, Yahoo noted that a “recent investigation” confirmed that sensitive personal account information associated with at least 500 million user accounts “was stolen from the company’s network in late 2014 by what it believes is a state-sponsored attack.” The stolen information included users’ names, email addresses, telephone numbers, dates of birth, hashed passwords, and in some cases, encrypted or unencrypted security questions and answers. Reports indicate that this data breach was the largest from a single site in history.
The plaintiffs allege that Yahoo’s actions constituted a reckless disregard for the safety and security of Yahoo users’ personal information and assert that Yahoo should be responsible for damages caused to its users. Unlike many other recent data breaches, Yahoo has not offered users any assistance with identity theft protection, even though its users are now at a much higher risk of having their identities stolen and must pay out of their own pockets to protect themselves.
In a joint statement, attorneys from Labaton Sucharow and Robbins Geller said, “Yahoo’s failure to safeguard its users’ very personal, sensitive information, in direct violation of its promises, is utterly unacceptable in this day and age. The fact that a breach of this magnitude went undetected at a tech giant like Yahoo for two years is astounding.”
The case, Schwartz v. Yahoo Inc., 16-cv-05456 (N.D. Cal.), was filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California.
About Labaton Sucharow LLP
Labaton Sucharow prosecutes precedent-setting class actions, recovering billions of dollars on behalf of defrauded consumers and investors. The Firm offers complex litigation services in the areas of data privacy, securities, antitrust, consumer protection, corporate governance and shareholder rights law, as well as whistleblower representation. Labaton Sucharow’s successful reputation is built not only on its team of nearly 60 attorneys, but also on its industry-leading in-house investigators, financial analysts, and forensic accountants. Offices are located in New York, NY and Wilmington, DE. For more information, visit labaton.com.
About Robbins Geller Rudman & Dowd LLP
Robbins Geller Rudman & Dowd LLP is widely recognized as one of the leading law firms advising U.S. and international institutional investors and other clients in complex litigation emphasizing securities fraud, corporate takeovers, shareholder derivative claims, consumer fraud, antitrust claims, insurance fraud, and intellectual property, as well as whistleblower protection and qui tam suits. With 200 lawyers in 10 offices, Robbins Geller has obtained many of the largest securities class action recoveries in history and ranked first in both the total amount recovered for investors and number of shareholder class action recoveries in ISS’s SCAS Top 50 Report for each of the last two years. Robbins Geller attorneys have shaped the law in the area of securities litigation and shareholder rights, and have recovered tens of billions of dollars on behalf of the Firm’s clients. Robbins Geller not only secures recoveries for defrauded investors, it also strives to implement corporate governance reforms, helping to improve the financial markets for investors worldwide, and to protect consumers from fraud and deceptive and unfair trade practices. Please visit rgrdlaw.com for more information.