Last week, Mediant Communications Inc. (Mediant) settled a class action lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York stemming from a 2019 data breach in which hackers accessed 200,000 individuals’ personal information from its proxy investor communication service. Mediant is based in New York and offers mutual funds and real estate investment trusts along with other financial services. The breach exposed individuals’ names, addresses, e-mail addresses, phone numbers, Social Security numbers, tax identification numbers, and account IDs, among other sensitive information.
Lead plaintiff, Phillip Toretto, sued Mediant, alleging that the hack was caused by Mediant’s poor network security and its failure to encrypt personal information stored and maintained on its systems. Additionally, Toretto claimed that Mediant failed to adequately notify its customers.
Judge Gregory H. Woods first determined in February that Toretto could proceed on his declaratory judgment and negligence claims. However, the court dismissed the claims brought against the publicly-traded company, Donnelly Financial Solutions, through which Mediant provides proxy investor communications services. The details of the settlement are anticipated within the next few weeks.