A class-action lawsuit filed against LinkedIn, accusing the platform of using private messages from Premium customers to train generative AI models, has been dismissed. The lawsuit was withdrawn by the plaintiff, Alessandro De La Torre, just over a week after it was filed in a California federal court, reported Reuters.
Filed in the US District Court for the Northern District of California, the lawsuit alleged that LinkedIn violated its privacy policies by disclosing the private InMail messages of Premium subscribers to third parties to train AI models. The complaint accused the Microsoft-owned platform of breaching its contracts with paying customers and violating the Stored Communications Act (SCA) and California’s Unfair Competition Law (UCL).
The core of the complaint focused on claims that LinkedIn had shared the contents of private messages, which are only accessible to Premium subscribers, with third-party entities without their consent. The lawsuit highlighted LinkedIn’s September 2024 privacy policy update, which indicated that user data could be used to train AI models. Additionally, the policy included an FAQ stating that opting out of data sharing would not affect data already used for training purposes, raising concerns over past data usage.
Changes to privacy settings and user confusion
In August 2024, LinkedIn introduced a new privacy setting, allowing users to opt out of sharing data for AI training. However, this setting was enabled by default, meaning users were automatically opted in unless they took action to disable it. The lawsuit claimed that this default setting and the timing of the privacy updates caused confusion among LinkedIn’s Premium subscribers, who were left uncertain about how their personal data was being used.
Eli Wade-Scott, the managing partner at Edelson PC, which represented De La Torre, expressed the concerns of affected users. “LinkedIn’s belated disclosures left consumers rightly concerned and confused about what was being used to train AI,” he said in a statement. However, he also acknowledged that LinkedIn had provided evidence to show that private messages were not used for AI training, offering reassurance to users. “Users can take comfort, at least, that LinkedIn has shown us evidence that it did not use their private messages to do that,” Wade-Scott said.
In response to the lawsuit and its subsequent withdrawal, LinkedIn took to its platform to clarify its position. Sarah Wight, the company’s vice president of legal affairs, confirmed that the allegations were unfounded. “We never did that,” Wight stated in a LinkedIn post, referring to the claim that the company had shared private messages with third parties for AI training. She further emphasised the importance of correcting the record, stating that the lawsuit had no merit.
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