Customers of T-Mobile are currently in a state of shock and anger after an employee has been accused of stealing nude images from their phone during a trade-in.
A Chicago area woman filed a lawsuit against T-Mobile after an employee allegedly stole pictures of her in her underwear from her device while it was being traded in at one of the company’s stores.
The woman, who chose to remain anonymous, took her device in to the Oak Lawn store to join the company’s trade-in promotion. In the promotion, customers could trade in their old phone for a discount on a new device.
While her phone was in the store; the woman says an employee accessed her personal photos and stole some of the images which were private and of her in her underwear.
The lawsuit states that an employee of the company went through “private and confidential images, videos, text messages and photographs” on the woman’s device without her permission.
The theft of sensitive images was not discovered until the woman received an unsolicited email from the employee which contained nude images of herself. She then filed a lawsuit against the company for violating her privacy.
The lawsuit states that the company failed to “possess and maintain sufficient physical security, personnel security, and administrative procedures to protect private documents from being accessed, viewed, or disseminated without authorization or consent.”
T-Mobile has yet to comment on the lawsuit but the woman has also filed a criminal complaint against the employee.
This news of the employee for stealing nude images from a customer’s device comes at a time when concerns about companies and their privacy policies have been at an all-time high.
It is a reminder to all companies that they must be extra vigilant in maintaining the security and privacy of customer’s personal data. Companies must be more aware of who they are employing in their stores and have clear protocols for how customer data is handled; as well as strict security measures in place to prevent any theft of such information.
It is still unclear what the outcome of the lawsuit will be but it is a serious reminder of how customers need to protect their data. Customers should make sure that they are using strong passwords and encrypting their data so that it is not accessible by any unauthorized personnel.
