A class action lawsuit accuses Lifetime, the company that operates the PeopleSmart online search engine, of violating the Illinois Right of Publicity Act by selling subscriptions that allow people to access Illinois residents' personal information.
PeopleSmart "enables users to conduct people searches in order to find up-to-date contact information quickly," says the lawsuit, filed in Cook County Circuit Court. "Visitors to PeopleSmart are able to search for individuals by name, employer, job title, email addresses, phone numbers, or usernames."
The plaintiffs are not subscribers to PeopleSmart and never gave their consent for the search engine to use their identifies or personal information, the suit says. The lawsuit claims this is a violation of the Illinois Right of Publicity Act (IRPA).
"Despite failing to obtain written consent from Plaintiffs and the Class, Lifetime nevertheless utilized their personal identifying information for the purpose of enticing users of its PeopleSmart platform to enter into paid subscriptions for full and continued access to reports generated by the platform," the suit says. "In other words, Lifetime used Plaintiffs’ and other class members’ identities for commercial purposes without their written permission in violation of IRPA."
The lawsuit seeks at least $1,000 per violation of the state law, punitive damage and legal fees.
The plaintiffs are represented by attorney Patrick J. Solberg, of the firm of Anderson+Wanca, of Rolling Meadows.