A London court has dismissed a class-action style legal case in the UK, filed against Google and its AI division, DeepMind, which had sought compensation for the misuse of NHS patients’ medical records. The ruling highlights the obstacles faced by compensation claims for privacy violations in the UK.
The lawsuit was brought by Andrew Prismall, on behalf of over 1.6 million individuals whose medical records were passed to DeepMind without their knowledge or consent. Google’s AI firm had been engaged by the Royal Free NHS Trust to co-develop an app to detect acute kidney injury, resulting in the transfer of patient data without the required legal basis.
Justice Heather Williams of the Royal Courts of Justice in London rejected the case because it did not meet the conditions of a representative legal action, which requires a claim based on common circumstances of the entire class, rather than individual circumstances. An attempt to win “lowest common denominator damages” for a reduced minimum harm for each member of the claimed class was also unsuccessful.
The ruling provided a boost to Google, which had faced a similar claim in 2021 but was upheld in the UK Supreme Court.
A viable legal claim for damages by individuals remains difficult due to the prohibitive expense – there are few options for UK citizens to obtain redress for misuse of their data. This situation is likely to change soon in the European Union, with a Collective Redress Directive that will facilitate representative actions and the potential to sue for damages caused by AI systems.
Google is an American multinational technology company that specializes in internet-related services and products. The company is renowned for its search engine, cloud computing, artificial intelligence, and digital advertising technologies, as well as its Android operating system, Chrome web browser, and Gmail email service. It is one of the world’s largest and most valuable companies, employing over 109,000 people in more than 70 offices around the world.
Andrew Prismall is a British consumer rights campaigner, lawyer, and public speaker. He has been involved in several high-profile anti-privacy lawsuits in the UK. He is best known for leading the campaign for equal access to justice in the UK and for his work in pursuing class action style lawsuits for governmental and corporate data breaches. Despite his legal setback against Google, he continues to fight for citizens’ rights to privacy and access to justice.
