Federal lawsuit over COVID-related tracking ‘spyware’ nearing settlement
SPRINGFIELD — A class action lawsuit against the state Department of Public Health over a pandemic-related tracking phone application is nearing a conclusion.
The parties are "on the verge of finalizing their written settlement agreement," they wrote in a joint status report filed last week. The plaintiffs are people who live or work in Massachusetts.
Filed in U.S. District Court in Springfield in 2022, the case says that the DPH installed a contact-tracing application onto a million New England residents' Android phones without their knowledge or permission. The application, which the plaintiffs call "spyware," shared information with other nearby phones, and if one person reported having COVID-19, the application notified those who had been nearby, the complaint says.
The lead attorney for the plaintiffs, Margaret Little of the New Civil Liberties Alliance, declined to comment Tuesday. The Attorney General's Office, which represents the state, is not able to comment on the case, a spokesperson said.
State residents from Great Barrington, Cambridge, Bridgewater, Northborough and Boston are named in the suit as plaintiffs. A man from Windham, New Hampshire, who regularly travels to Massachusetts for work, is also a named plaintiff.
Lead plaintiff Robert Wright, a professor who lives in Great Barrington, alleged the application was downloaded onto his device in 2021 without his permission.
The suit asked for $1,000, for the state to work with Google to delete the application on devices and the destruction of the data collected.
"These secret installations not only invade owners' (reasonable) expectation of privacy, but they also intrude upon owners' property right in their mobile devices by occupying valuable storage space," the complaint reads.
After few people opted into a voluntary contact-tracing app, the DPH "mass-installed the app without device owners' awareness or permission," the plaintiffs' complaint says. In the state's response, it denies that allegation.
The plaintiffs called the alleged actions a "brazen disregard for civil liberties."
In court filings, the state said that during the COVID-19 pandemic, an exposure notification system it set up with Google was optional and anonymous. It did not allow the state to covertly track people's locations, the defendants said.
Last year, U.S. District Judge Mark G. Mastroianni ruled against the state's motion asking for dismissal of the case.
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