AVVO Gets Sued for Using a Lawyer’s Professional Information Without Consent

According to the ABA Journal, a Chicago lawyer is suing the lawyer review and ranking site Avvo “…contending that the company’s online lawyer directory is violating a[n Illinois] state statute by using professional information on the site without permission.”

It’s an odd suit. Evidently, this Chicago lawyer is aggrieved that Avvo compiles data, including her name, from publicly available sources, then uses that compiled information to market its attorney marketing services to lawyers. She sees this as Avvo profiting from her personal information. She hasn’t paid Avvo for its services and doesn’t want them to be able to use her information for their own benefit. Since lots of other lawyers in Illinois have also not paid Avvo for their services but have their personal information used in this same way, this complaint is filed as a class action suit.

It’ll be interesting to see what Avvo’s response to this complaint is. I suspect they’ll basically tell the plaintiff that her suit is a bunch of hogwash, but we’ll see.