Class action privacy suit against Facebook
Max Schrems, an Austrian lawyer, has filed an action against Facebook over a list of alleged EU law violations.
Schrems was forced to limit numbers to 25,000, after his action started receiving 7,000 sign-ups/day from over 100 countries. The suits claims a symbolic €500 per plaintiff for claimed violations including Facebook's privacy policy, its alleged participation in the US National Security Agency's PRISM programme, and tracking users' visits to other websites via the "Like" function.
The subject of the suit is Facebook's overseas headquarters, Facebook Ireland. As such it is not open to users from USA or Canada. Nearly all signatories are within the EU, with half hailing from Austria and Germany. Croatia, UK, Finland and the Netherlands followed.
Of course the Facebook behemoth may barely notice Schrems' efforts. To put the action in perspective, the signatories represents 1 Facebook user in every 33,000. But they will hope this snowball becomes an avalanche of public opinion against what they see as the flagrant abuse of the individual's right to privacy.