Insurance company Lemonade has agreed to resolve a class action lawsuit claiming it violated the Illinois biometric privacy laws with video claim submissions. The $4 million settlement will benefit a nationwide class of Lemonade policyholders who provided the first notice of loss through a video claim submission between 25th June 2019 and 27th May 2021. There is also a subclass of same class members residing in Illinois. For being eligible for the benefits of the class action settlement, consumers should have submitted video claims from which Lemonade could have captured, collected, otherwise obtained, or disclosed biometric identifiers like facial geometry.
Settlement Website: LemonadeBIPASettlement.com
Objection Deadline: 08/08/2022
Exclusion Deadline: 08/08/2022
Claim Form: https://lemonadebipasettlement.com/Claim
Deadline For Submitting Claim Form: Class members are required to submit their claim form either online or by mail within 22nd August 2022 for getting their payment. A Unique ID is required to file an online claim. Class members can contact the settlement administrator if they don’t have a Unique ID.
Final Hearing Date: A hearing has been scheduled for 25th August 2022 to consider the fairness of this class action settlement. Class members don’t need to attend this hearing but they might do so for speaking to the court about the settlement.
Settlement Amount: $4 million
Potential Claim Amount: To be decided
Proof Of Purchase: Class members are required to provide their name, email address, mailing address, phone number, the address of the property that is the subject of their claim (if different from their current contact address), and certification. The settlement administrator will contact the class member for additional information required.
Lemonade is an insurance company offering policies for homeowner’s insurance, renter’s insurance, pet insurance, auto insurance, and term life insurance. The policyholders of Lemonade are presented with the option of submitting a video during their insurance claim processing. However, the Lemonade policyholders revealed that the insurer violated various consumer privacy rights by collecting biometric information without consent from video submissions.
Both the collection and storage of biometric information allegedly violate Illinois’ BIPA (Biometric Information Privacy Act). BIPA regulates how businesses collect, store and share biometric data like facial geometry scans, fingerprints, and more. Companies are required to get the consent of customers before collecting or sharing biometrics under BIPA. They are also required to follow stringent standards on retaining and destroying this information.
However, Lemonade failed to follow these regulations thus putting consumers at risk of getting their biometric credentials stolen or misused. Class members became aware of Lemonade Insurance Co. collecting their biometric data after the company posted a series of now-deleted tweets explaining its use of facial recognition technology in fraud detection. Facial recognition technology finds widespread use in scanning the images of human faces for generating a “faceprint.”
In its Data Privacy Pledge, Lemonade Insurance Co. assures its customers that it won’t collect, sell, require or share users’ biometric data. According to the class action lawsuit, this caused unsuspecting consumers into relying on Lemonade’s guarantees. Lemonade has agreed to resolve these allegations with a $4 million settlement deal despite not admitting any wrongdoing. Both the national and Illinois subclass members are eligible for cash payments under the terms of the settlement.
Out of the settlement fund, $1 million will go into funding the payments of the nationwide class whereas the remaining $3 million will go into funding the Illinois subclass payments. The share of each class member will be proportional to the funds they are eligible for. However, no payment estimates are currently available. Other than cash payments, the settlement will also offer non-monetary relief to protect the rights of class members.
Starting from May 2021, Lemonade stopped collecting biometric information from video submissions. Within a week of final approval, they will delete all biometric data collected previously. The company has also promised to comply with BIPA and other applicable privacy laws if they decide to collect this data in the future.