A California federal court has been presented with a lawsuit aiming to hold LinkedIn accountable for allegedly leveraging the private messages of its Premium users to develop artificial intelligence (AI) models without their informed consent. According to the complaint, filed on behalf of affected users, LinkedIn enacted a privacy setting last August that automatically enrolled users in a program allowing third parties to access their personal conversations for AI training.
The lawsuit accuses LinkedIn, a subsidiary of Microsoft, of trying to mask these activities by altering its privacy policy in September to imply that user data could be shared with AI stakeholders. A spokesperson for LinkedIn has vehemently denied these allegations, declaring them groundless and without merit. The lawsuit points to recent modifications in LinkedIn's frequently asked questions, which stated that users possess the option to prevent data sharing for AI but noted that previous training processes would remain unaffected by such choices.
The legal documents further contend that LinkedIn has exhibited a pattern of behavior aimed at concealing its practices, suggesting awareness of potential breaches of user contracts and privacy obligations. The lawsuit seeks $1,000 per affected user for supposed violations of the US federal Stored Communications Act and additional damages for contractual breaches and violations of California's unfair competition law.
While addressing user concerns, LinkedIn reassured that it does not facilitate data sharing for AI applications in the UK, European Economic Area, and Switzerland, as noted in an email last year. With over one billion users globally, a substantial segment resides in the United States. Despite this contentious situation, LinkedIn reported $1.7 billion in revenue from premium subscriptions in 2023 and has seen a significant rise in subscribers as it integrates more AI functionalities into its services.
