One of the largest school bus operations in the U.S. has become one of the latest targets of a class action lawsuit under Illinois’ biometrics privacy law.
On July 7, First Student Inc. was sued in Cook County Circuit Court.
The lawsuit, filed by attorneys with the firm of Stephan Zouras LLC, of Chicago, accused the Cincinnati-based First Student of violating the privacy rights of its workers and job applicants by requiring them to scan their fingerprints for background checks on those applying for jobs with First Student.
The class action asserts First Student did not comply with Illlinois state notice and consent requirements, as spelled out in the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act.
Fingerprints are considered biometric identifying information under the Illinois BIPA law. Other forms of biometric identifying information include hand prints, facial geometry and retinal scans.
Plaintiffs’ lawyers in Illinois have launched a mounting surge of class actions in Cook County and other courtrooms in the state under the BIPA law in recent years. Hundreds of such actions have been filed, with most targeting employers who require fingerprint scans to either authenticate workers’ identities when they punch in and out of work shifts, or to access secure or sensitive areas in a work place, such as a drug locker at a hospital.
The cases can cost businesses many millions of dollars, depending on how many people they employ or how extensive the violations are alleged to be.
One such case was recently settled for about $1.4 million. However, Facebook agreed to pay $550 million to settle a class action lawsuit under the Illinois BIPA law, accusing it of violating the rights of Illinois residents whose faces were “tagged” in photos posted to the social media platform.
In the case against First Student, the lawsuit asserts First Student did not secure written authorization from job applicants before completing the fingerprint scans, nor did the company provide its workers and job applicants with notices concerning how the scanned prints would be stored, used, shared and ultimately destroyed.
Neither did the company post that retention schedule in a location accessible to job applicants or the public, the lawsuit asserts.
The lawsuit was filed on behalf of named plaintiff Roxanne Brewton, an Illinois resident who applied for a job as a bus aide for First Student in 2018, according to the complaint.
The plaintiffs seek to expand the lawsuit to include a class of many others who similarly applied for jobs with First Student in Illinois and whose fingerprints were scanned as part of the background check portion of the job application process.
The lawsuit seeks damages of $1,000-$5,000 for each alleged violation of BIPA, plus attorney fees.
Attorneys representing the plaintiffs include Megan E. Shannon, James B. Zouras and Ryan F. Stephan, of Stephan Zouras.