GameStop Sued for Swiping Buyers' Private Information
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| Personal information is....personal |
One Alameda County woman trusted a local GameStop employee who had asked her for her private numbers -- address and credit cards -- as she bought games from the retailer. She rattled the information off, without question.
Now, she is leading a class action lawsuit against the Bay Area company, accusing it of violating her privacy.
Melissa Arechiga filed the lawsuit last week in San Francisco Superior Court, saying that the store employee requested "personal identification information" from Arechiga without explaining what it would be used for.
She gave away her information, thinking it was necessary for the purchase -- but apparently it wasn't.
The GameStop employee punched in the names and numbers into the electronic register and "made no effort to delete the personal information" after the purchase was complete -- a violation of California privacy laws, lawyers argue.
Plaintiffs aren't certain what their information was used for, but they are asking for $1,000 each in damages. And that could buy them a lot of video games.
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