Low cost airline EasyJet is facing a potential group legal action by many thousands of its customers after the airline confirmed that the personal data of 9 million of its customers were lost during a cyber attack.
So far nearly ten thousand customers have joined the group action, making it one of the UK’s largest data breach group-actions. It comes just after the airline said it had been targeted by a sophisticated cyber attack, and that email addresses and travel details of 9 million of its customers had been breached.
Investigation
Its investigation also found that about 2,200 customers also had their credit card details stolen.
Acting Legal firm PGMBM is leading the group action against easyJet after filing legal papers in May. It recently said it had ten thousand customers from more than 50 different countries joining the group action. Tom Goodhead, PGMBM managing partner, said: “This is a monumental data breach and a terrible failure of responsibility that has a serious impact on easyJet’s customers, who are coming forward in their thousands".
Easyjet Said
”EasyJet responded with: “We are aware that a class-action law firm has filed a claim against easyJet in the High Court and that other firms are advertising their services to do the same. This is not uncommon and just because these firms are advertising does not mean they have a strong claim.”
Scale
The size of easy Jet’s data loss is not as large as some previous attacks, with hotel chain Marriott’s losing 500 million customers data during a breach in 2018. Some industry experts suggest easy jet could also face fines of tens of millions of pounds for breaching the new GDPR rules (General Data Protection Regulation).
Compensation
Some legal websites are suggesting that the potential level of compensation for those affected by the data breach is in the region of £2,000 per person. With 10,000 already signed up to the class action, that's a compensation payment of £20,000,000 already plus of course the lawyers fees on top.
All this comes at a very difficult time for easyJet. The low-cost airline has suffered with other carriers during the Covid-19 pandemic, and recently announced plans to cut up to 30 per cent of its 15,000 staff with no end crisis still in site.