Civil V. Big Data Corp.

Civil Liberties Union V. Big Data Corporations was a court case that challenged the use of personal data by companies, notably the defendant Big Data Corp. The court upheld the practices of Big Data Corp. but a decline in usership and public favour of the company followed.

Case
The Civil Liberties Union of planet Tau IV represented over 70,000 plantiffs in the lawsuit who claimed damages and violation of rights through the communications network SpaceFace, which is owned and operated by Big Data Corp. The charges brought against the defendant were as follows:

1. Selling of location data, including travel logs, of its users. Users reported increases in transportation fees of their most commonly used travel routes. Several users also reported unsolicited third party tracking of their location, a violation of their privacy.

2. Selling of personal data, including consumer preferences and frequency of communications with other users. Users reported social sabotage caused by the release of their communications history, as well as incrased monopoly in their consumer marketplaces, allegedly caused by release of their purchase histories.

3. Release of confidential information, including location history, consumer purchases, and communications history through a network breach by a third party hacker.

The defendant presented as evidence the SpaceFace "User Agreement and Privacy Policy." In examination of this evidence, the lines "SpaceFace is not liable for third party security breaches of network data" and "Users agree to the use of personal data for research to improve consumer experience" were used as major lines of argument for the defendant.

The court ruled in favor of Big Data Corporations. The result was a decline in SpaceFace usage by 20%, mainly from users in Zones 2-6. The stock price of Big Data Corp. did not decrease significantly following the court ruling.