In the latest development in the controversial issue of CarrierIQ tracking and saving user data, a lawsuit has been filed against the company in question CarrierIQ, Samsung and HTC.
According to reports, the class action lawsuits, has been filed in Chicago and St. Louis, and seeks hundreds of millions of dollars on behalf of all US residents who had their mobile phones containing the software. Both the cases come under the Federal Wiretap Act, a law that forbids intercepting “oral, wire or electronic communications” and provides penalties of $100 per day for every violation that takes place.
The lawsuit was filed by Erin Janek, who owns an HTC Android phone from Sprint. The lawsuit charges Carrier IQ and HTC of secretly monitoring and collecting data from Janek’s private communications on the phone without Janek’s permission or knowledge.
A St. Louis lawsuit against HTC states the following:
“Plaintiff, Erin Janek owns an HTC Android phone using the Sprint network. At all relevant times Plaintiff used her phone to electronically send over her cell phone network various types of private data. This data was not readily accessible to the general public. She did not know that Defendants were surreptitiously monitoring and collecting this data, nor did she give them permission to do so.”
Both Samsung and HTC have agreed that they installed the software over their devices but that was done only on the request of wireless carriers who in turn say that they used the software only to help out their users when they faced any problem with the network coverage and did not record any personal details.
The next few days are surely going to be tough for all the companies in question.
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