14 DAY TRIAL // Seagate employees are suing the company after one of its execs fell for a phishing scam and sent tax information to cyber-criminals earlier this year.
Affected employees have banded together and filed a class-action lawsuit against Seagate. The lawsuit was filed in the Northern District Court of California on April 14, but only recently came to light.
Email scam exposes details of over 10,000 employees
Back in March, a Seagate exec had received an email spoofed to look like it came from Seagate's CEO, asking for a large number of W-2 forms, for past and present Seagate employees.
The exec attached the data of over 10,000 employees to the email and replied without double-checking the email's source. A few days later, the employee discovered he was duped, and the company started sending notification letters to all staff affected by the incident.
According to court documents obtained by The Register, Seagate employees are now reporting that information stolen in the incidents has been used for tax fraud.
Employees are reporting tax fraud incidents
Some employees said they had to pay for financial services in order to deal with the attempted tax fraud attempts. Others are afraid the same will happen to them. Employees are now asking a judge for financial compensations for all affected parties.
In March, Seagate offered affected employees a two-year membership to Experian's ProtectMyID service, on the company's expense.
"Too bad having credit monitoring through Experian won’t protect employees from the real threat here - tax refund fraud," said Brian Krebs, the security researcher that broke the story in March.
Seagate's lawyers are now attempting to have the lawsuit dismissed, on the grounds that the company is not responsible for the actions of online criminals. Employees are demanding a full jury trial.