Internet Private Investors Could be Liable for Acts of a Stalker

The New Hampshire Supreme Court ruled in Remsberg v. Docusearch, Inc. that online investigation companies (and all those dealing in third party information) may be liable for harm resulting from the release of third party information to clients. Specifically, the Court held that the foreseeable risk of criminal harm caused by stalking and identity theft outweigh the normal presumption that a private actor will not be liable for the criminal attacks of third parties. In this case, Liam Youens fatally shot Amy Lynn Boyer outside her workplace on October 15, 1999, after having obtained her social security number (SSN), residential address and workplace address from Docusearch Inc.. Docusearch had obtained Ms. Boyer's SSN from a credit reporting agency without her consent, and obtained her workplace address via a pretext phone call. The Court decided that:

1. At common law, an information broker (which was broadly defined) owes a cognizable legal duty to third parties whose information it sells in relation to that information.
2. An individual has a cause of action in intrusion of seclusion against an information broker who obtains the individual's SSN from a credit agency without consent, for damages caused by the sale of the information.
3. An individual does not have a cause of action in common law against an information broker who has deceitfully obtained the individual's work address.
4. An individual does not have a cause of action in commercial appropriation in the instances outlined in 2 and 3, since the gain resulted from the sale of information not from an unauthorized association with the individual.
5. Under New Hampshire's Commercial Protection Act (N.H. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 358-A), an information broker is liable to the person deceived for damages caused by the sale of a workplace address, where that information was obtained by means of a pretext phone call.

For the full text of the decision, visit http://www.courts.state.nh.us/supreme/opinions/2003/remsb017.htm