SimplyHR | Employment & Labor Blog 

Companies encouraged to revisit privacy policies in light of projected increase in litigation

The Illinois Supreme Court in January 2019 held that plaintiffs bringing claims under the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA) are not required to allege that they suffered any actual harm as the result of a violation of the act. Instead, it’s enough to allege that an employer or other entity simply violated BIPA’s notice, consent or disclosure requirements. The court’s opinion in Rosenbach v. Six Flags is expected to result in an increase in class action litigation under BIPA, which regulates how private entities use information based on “biometric identifiers” such as fingerprints and retina scans.