LinkedIn reaches settlement over emails

The young professional’s favorite social media site has reached yet another settlement in one of the many class action lawsuits it is currently facing. LinkedIn has agreed to pay $13 million to compensate the users affected by this suit.

LinkedIn users filed this suit in California back in 2013 claiming that the ‘Add Connections’ feature that the website used accessed their personal e-mail accounts and sent out multiple notifications on their behalf requesting that individuals join the network.

Fortune noted that users said this feature ended up “hurting their professional reputation, not helping it” and described the notifications sent out by the site as a “barrage of e-mails.”

The company had hoped the lawsuit would be dismissed before it reached this point, but U.S.- District Judge Lucy Koh allowed most of these claims to progress.

Users who are eligible to collect from this settlement received a claim number from the site and can file claim numbers on a third party website. LinkedIn will then compensate individuals an amount to be determined later by the number of claims filed.

Judge Koh, who will have the final say in approving the settlement, has also demanded that LinkedIn clarify how the ‘Add Connections’ feature works and make it clear to users how they can choose whether or not to utilize this feature.

This settlement is in addition to the settlement made earlier this year to compensate those users who were a victim of the website’s security breech back in June 2012. The security breech violated the website’s User Agreement and Privacy Policies to “utilize long-standing, industry standard protocols and technology to protect users’ personally identified information," according to Recruiting Daily.

With these settlements will come many changes for LinkedIn as a company, and for its users.

Hopefully the changes will promote the website’s intention, and allow professionals to continue to interact.