Karasik Park, Or, A Tour Of The Data Breach Class Action Settlement Landscape

In 2021, Justice Perell of the Ontario Superior Court considered whether to approve the settlement in Karasik v Yahoo Inc., a class action resulting from cyber attacks that compromised Yahoo users' account information.>¹ As discussed in "Data breach class actions: Canadian Courts taking a harder look," this case (which remains unpublished) provided valuable insight into the state of privacy breach class actions, with Justice Perell conducting an in-depth review of approved settlements for such actions. Three years later, we consider whether the pattern of modest settlement amounts Justice Perell uncovered has continued or changed.

Karasik's summary of settlements to 2021

To inform his evaluation of the settlement before him in Karasik, Justice Perell reviewed the history of data breach class action settlements up to 2021. Of the 36 actions he considered, 27 had been certified and 11 had approved settlements. The per capita value for an individual class member