LinkedIn sued for leaking user data to advertisers

Business social networking site Linkedin has been sued for violating users privacy, in a suit filed with a Californian court.

The site is accused of handing advertisers information about their users. San Francisco resident Kevin Low is furious, claiming that Linkedin gave ad networks his information that allowed them to follow him around the internet with tracking cookies.

Low Lawyer's state in the suit “Had he been given the choice, Mr. Low would not have disclosed his personally identifiable browsing history to third parties. Mr. Low was embarrassed and humiliated by the disclosure of his personally identifiable browsing history.”

Low is seeking a class action status for his suit, which would allow other users to join in the legal battle. A Linkedin spokesperson said that the company would defend themselves ‘vigorously' and said the suit has no merit.

Low is claiming that referrer headers sent to advertising networks and others by Linkedin include a unique identifier that is used in conjunction with a persistent LinkedIn cookie. He says this violates U.S. Federal wiretap laws as well as local California state laws. His name can be found out due to this information, which is a breach of LinkedIn's own privacy policy.

KitGuru says: Will be interesting to find out how much, if any, information has been given to advertisers.

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