10 women continued the tea application after hacked photos, disclosed online

The tea application, designed for women to share anonymous information on men in their regions with other women, was struck with 10 potential collective appeals before the federal and state courts After a data violation Led to the leak of thousands of selfies, identification photos and private online conversations.

All proceedings allege that Tea Dating Advice Inc., the company that created the TEA application, has been negligent in its data practices and has broken a contract with its users.

Pursuits could lead to tea to pay tens of millions of dollars in damages to the complainants, which could be catastrophic for the company, an expert at NBC News said.

A tea spokesperson refused to comment on the proceedings.

The application gained popularity at the end of July and climbed at the top of the Apple App Store As many women have sought to share information with other women on men, they went out together or were out. The application allows its users to download photos of men, to consider them as “red flags” or “green flags” and to share other information about them. On Tuesday, the application was still classified third on the list of free apps for the Apple App Store.

To reach the application, users are required to take verification photos which, according to tea, are deleted after their submission. A tea spokesman previously declared to NBC News that “this data had initially been stored in accordance with the application requirements of the prevention of cyberbullying”.

The first violation occurred on July 25. A tea spokesman told NBC News that he included around 72,000 images, including 59,000 images in which publications, comments and direct messages were visible.

404 media reported Two days later, tea had a second security problem, in which more than 1.1 million direct user messages, extending from the beginning of 2023 to last month, were exposed. Tea had confirmed to NBC News that a violation occurred in which “certain direct messages (DMS) were accessible as part of the initial incident”.

Scott Cole, a lawyer who leads a legal action against the application, said that his client, Griselda Reyes, had registered for the application only a few days before the violation occurred. The prosecution indicates that Reyes had received an opinion from TEA that her data was involved in the violation and that consequently, she has since taken measures to explore “credit monitoring and insurance options against identity theft”. A tea spokesperson previously declared that the violation would have given access to a “set of data compared to February 2024.”

On Tuesday, a judge granted a request that an anonymous plaintiff had submitted his file to be combined with Reyes and three others.

“Her particular concerns have more to do with the information she shared with others on the site and how it could come back to haunt her in the future, and I think it is probably the concern No. 1 that I have heard directly or indirectly from users,” said Cole.

One of the costumes lists the Right’s online discussion forum 4CHAN and the social platform X as defendants, alleging that they allowed bad players to disseminate personal information from users. The day before the violation, 4Chan users had called for a “hacking and leak” campaign. On the day of the leak, a 4Chan user had published a link which alleges that the pursuit allowed people to download the database of the images, some of which seemed to circulate later on X..

On X, users began to circulate a link to a website called Teaspill which allowed people to classify the photos of women according to attractiveness. X and 4chan did not respond to requests for comments.

The complainant of the prosecution against Tea, X and 4Chan, who is anonymously listed as Jane Doe, joined the application “to anonymously warn other women in her Northern California community about a man who has sexually assaulted at least two other women”.

“The application promised him this anonymity. He promised him security. He promised to delete his verification data. The tea has broken each of these promises,” said the costume.

Five of the complainants in the prosecution are appointed, while five are anonymously listed as Jane Doe.

John Yanchunis, a user lawyer who filed another case anonymously as Jane Doe on Thursday, said his client had faced immense online harassment due to the violation.

“Due to the violation, some very sensitive information has become accessible to the public, which led some people to engage in online harassment,” he said. “It was devastating for her, because it would be for anyone to be the subject of ridicule. She underwent emotional distress and had to take measures to ensure that she can defend as best as she can against the two attacks as well as the continuous threat to identity theft. ”

Brian Fitzpatrick, professor at the Vanderbilt Law School who specializes in combinations of collective appeal, said that it may be easy to prove that defendants are responsible for data violations in similar collective appeal actions but more difficult to prove damages, such as data from people are used with maliciousness.

But Fitzpatrick said that users have circulated information from online tea users, including the one who would have Created a card With the domestic addresses of users of 1, tea may have more difficulty fighting against damage.

At least four of the proceedings are looking for at least $ 5 million in damages, although the amounts granted could climb much more.

Fitzpatrick said that, as in numerous data breaches against large companies such as MGM Resorts And MobileColonies can reach hundreds of millions of dollars.

He said that such cases generally involve millions of members of the course, which generally divide the money from the regulation. For a small business like Tea, which, according to its Linkedin pageonly has five employees, an unfavorable decision could be extremely harmful, which means higher checks for members of the pursuit class, because its user base is still relatively low compared to those of large companies.

“We may not know if it will become a real as opposed to a potential collective recourse for months or even years,” said Fitzpatrick. “All class members are automatically included. They will have the opportunity to withdraw, but if they do not, they are included. ”

Many prosecution have classified their class members like those who are “located in a similar way” like the complainants. One of the prosecution indicates that its class members “are so numerous that the junction of all the members is impracticable”, but that it believes that it is “composed of millions of people who have been damaged” by the TEA application.

The founder of the company, Sean Cook, said in An average interview In May, he started tea after seeing his mother’s dating experiences, especially “how easy it was for catfish, crooks and criminals to enjoy women on dating applications and how much traditional dating applications are doing little to protect users.”

According to his LinkedIn page, Cook created and “self -funded” tea in November 2022. Before that, he worked in technology in San Francisco since 2019.

Yanchunis and Cole said it was difficult to estimate how much a combination of tea could be settled, because the number of members of the prosecution is developing. The tea website indicates the application has more than 6 million users.

“This could be more an existential threat to their existence,” said Fitzpatrick. “Not perhaps so much because of the amount of money they might have to pay, but just because, I think, it’s horrible for their reputation. I don’t know if people will trust them, and therefore they could lose all their users.”

Yanchunis said that these cases differ from many other cases of data violation due to the sensitivity of information.

“What is unique here is the way this application has favored the security and security of the platform, and therefore people of this type of application will reveal things that they may not reveal otherwise,” he said. “I could tell a girlfriend something that I would not say to anyone else, because we are in a close relationship. So, this type of information via this application can be disclosed, and this could be very devastating when revealed, as it was in this situation.”

A user of the application, who asked for anonymity due to security problems, told NBC News that he had been on the application since the end of 2023 and felt very anxious and paranoid since the violation.

“Originally, the application was launched for women, and I don’t think they should have talked to men about it,” the user said. “People should feel free to join the application and read interesting comments, and if not, you take this application.”