Is this the Next Class Action Gold Rush

First it was tobacco, then pharmaceutical giants and financial institutions. Inevitably when people have suffered, an army of ambulance chasers appear to save the day, at a price of 30% plus expenses from whatever a plaintiff receives. Mind you I wouldn’t be bitter about attorney’s fleecing their clients to line their pockets at the expense of society’s pain if I thought they actually cared about their clients.

Perusing through my email and social media this week I found the next goldmine of class action suits for the legal community. I would begin with the site that informed me that someone was looking for me. You see this site has collected and consolidated all of my public personal information it could, and posted My Life online in one place for the convenience of identity thieves everywhere. They were so kind as to provide this service for every American over the age of 18.

After the shock set in I tried to delete my page in hopes of protecting my data. I came to find out that this site, that posts My Life for all the world to see, makes it’s money through extortion. The only way that you can conceal or delete your personal information from prying eyes, on a page you never created, is to become a paid premium member. To instill a sense of urgency in becoming a paid premium member this site openly threatens you, regularly, with statements like “we’ve detected a new threat to your online identity”, “8 new people viewed your info”, and “someone may have viewed your background report”.

I’m a cancer patient on disability with a limited fixed income. Extortion payments to protect my identity isn’t a luxury I’m capable of affording. I wouldn’t be surprised when someone’s identity is stolen as a direct result of the parasites that posted My Life online for all the world to see, and the website and others like it are inundated with class action lawsuits because of it.

In a digital age when a person’s life can be stolen or destroyed with a series of key strokes I’m actually looking forward to when the legal community wakes up to the goldmine that exists in attacking cyber companies that peddle in personal information.

 © Christopher L. Hedges and AverageJoesStory.com, 2015. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Christopher L. Hedges and AverageJoesStory.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.