A new class action has taken aim at two companies used by landlords to verify the identities of people applying to lease apartments and rental homes, accusing the companies of violating Illinois’ biometric privacy law by allegedly improperly scanning the faces of potential tenants.
The lawsuit against CheckpointID and IDScan.net means the two companies have become some of the latest facing potentially massive financial damages under the law known as the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act.
According to its website, CheckpointID, based in Carrollton, Texas, has developed products and services specifically to help landlords and their property managers detect and combat rental application fraud. According to the complaint, CheckpointID’s products work in conjunction with tech supplied by IDScan.net, based in Metairie, Louisiana.
According to the complaint, Heger applied to rent an apartment in Cobbler Square Lofts in the 1300 block of N. Wells, in Chicago’s Old Town Neighborhood, in May 2022.
Heger then was directed by the property manager for that apartment complex to scan and upload a copy of his Illinois driver’s license to verify his identity to complete the application process. He then allegedly was required to use his phone to upload a new photo of his face, to allow CheckpointID, using technology supplied by IDScan.net, to compare the two photos and confirm Heger was who he claimed to be.
As part of that process, Heger asserts CheckpointID, using IDScan, scanned his facial images and created a template of his so-called facial geometry.
However, the complaint claims CheckpointID never required Heger or other users to consent to the facial scans, or provided them with notices concerning how the companies would use, share and ultimately destroy the biometric identity scans.
Heger asserts in his complaint that this violates the Illinois BIPA law.
The lawsuit asserts there are potentially thousands of others who also were required by landlords to use CheckpointID to similarly upload photos of their drivers’ licenses and new photos of their face, to allow landlords to verify their identities as part of the lease application process.
The lawsuit seeks to expand the complaint to include potentially everyone in Illinois who similarly uploaded photos as part of the lease application process since 2018.
The lawsuit could expose CheckpointID and IDScan to massive potential financial liability. Under the BIPA law, plaintiffs are allowed to demand damages of up to $5,000 per violation. Under recent rulings, the Illinois Supreme Court has said the BIPA law should be interpreted to define individual violations as each time a company scans someone’s so-called biometric identifiers, defined as physical characteristics including fingerprints, retinal scans and facial geometry.
When multiplied across thousands of people and multiple scans per person, damages can quickly rise well into the many millions or even billions of dollars, placing businesses in Illinois at risk of massive damages that judges and business advocates have described as “absurd” and “catastrophic,” threatening businesses targeted by these lawsuits with annihilation.
At the same time, plaintiffs’ attorneys stand typically to gain about a third of any settlements or judgments they may secure.
Facing high levels of financial risk, a growing number of employers and other businesses facing such lawsuits have opted to settle, rather than take their chances at trial. Settlements have ranged from hundreds of thousands of dollars to as much as the $650 million Facebook famously agreed to pay to settle claims related to its practice of scanning the faces of Illinoisans featured in photos uploaded to its platform.
No landlords were named as defendants in the lawsuit.