Court Rejects Damages Claim against Benesse over Info Leak

June 21, 2018

Tokyo- Tokyo District Court on Wednesday rejected a damages claim mainly against correspondent education service provider Benesse Corp. over a massive customer information leak in 2014.

"The leak did not cause real damage," the court said in a ruling in the lawsuit filed by 185 claimants seeking a total of 14.7 million yen in damages.

This is the first verdict among a series of suits filed over the leak. The total number of plaintiffs stands at 12,000.

In the ruling, a Benesse group company tasked to manage customer information was held responsible for devising proper measures to prevent leaks of such data.

Benesse itself failed to fulfill its responsibility to supervise the group company, the ruling also said.

Meanwhile, the verdict said confidentiality of the leaked information, such as names, addresses and dates of birth, is considered relatively low.

The leak did not cause emotional distress serious enough to warrant damages, the ruling added.

A former computer system engineer was sentenced to 30 months in prison and fined 3 million yen for stealing and leaking 29.89 million sets of Benesse customer information.

At the time of the incident, he was working for a company commissioned by the group company to manage Benesse customer information. His guilty ruling has become final. Jiji Press