GIPA (Genetic Information Privacy Act) Class Actions

Illinois’ Genetic Information Privacy Act prohibits companies from requesting their employees – and even job applicants – to disclose their genetic information.

GIPA’s main purpose is to promote genetic testing by addressing fears that the test results will be used in a discriminatory manner. Genetic testing, when used appropriately, may be beneficial to an individual; for example, the saliva tests used by 23andme or a BRCA gene test can reveal whether you may be predisposed to a higher risk of numerous disorders and cancers.

An individual should not be afraid to complete this testing to learn about their heightened health risks due to improper use of such results by their employer. GIPA works to prevent this situation by prohibiting employers from asking their employees or potential employees about their genetic information. This includes an individual’s family medical history.

In other words, companies can ask about a person’s own medical conditions that have already developed, but the employer cannot ask about the potential or current employee’s family members’ medical or health history in order to try to predict whether a condition is more likely to develop in the future.

GIPA is similar to a more well-known and highly litigated privacy statute – Illinois’ Biometric Information Privacy Act, or BIPA. BIPA governs biometric information, such as fingerprints, voice recognition, and facial geometry. Thousands of BIPA lawsuits have been filed in recent years, many resulting in landmark multi-million-dollar settlements.

The legislature’s goals for GIPA and BIPA are identical because biometric and genetic information are some of the most sensitive forms of information; if this information gets into the wrong hands, the victim is essentially helpless. Unlike a credit card or telephone number, a person cannot simply change their fingerprint or family history if that information is leaked. For these reasons, in several recent cases, Illinois courts are already interpreting GIPA and BIPA in similar ways, but are recognizing key distinctions that show the protections afforded by the GIPA statute are even stronger than those afforded by GIPA. The Illinois legislature has also indicated that genetic information is even more important than biometric information because successful GIPA lawsuits can seek up to three times more money than those alleging violations of BIPA.

Beginning in 2023, Siri & Glimstad was one of the first – if not THE first – to file lawsuits alleging that Illinois companies violated GIPA by asking their prospective or current employees about their family medical history. Siri & Glimstad recognized that GIPA only benefits the people of Illinois if law firms actually file lawsuits to enforce the law, but for some reason, no one had done so for 25 years. As leaders in this space, Siri & Glimstad is the clear choice!

Williams v. Peoples Gas, Circuit Court of Cook County Case No. 2023CH08058 – the plaintiff claimed Peoples Gas violated GIPA by requesting family medical histories from its employees who filed workers’ compensation claims after they were injured on the job, and also during preemployment physicals. Like SG360, the defendant here also filed a motion to dismiss, arguing that the plaintiff did not allege a disclosure that constitutes genetic information under GIPA. However, in denying the motion, the judge held that it is “beyond dispute” that family medical history, including whether medical conditions with genetic predispositions have manifested in an individual’s parents, is the type of genetic information protected by GIPA.

Croff v. Central DuPage Hospital Assoc., Circuit Court of Cook County Case No. 2023-CH-07912 – plaintiffs allege their genetic information was requested in violation of GIPA when they were asked for their family health history during a pre-employment physical and were specifically asked about their spouse’s inheritable conditions related to fertility and birth defects. In denying the motion to dismiss (which was affirmed after the defendants filed for reconsideration), the judge held: (1) such allegations sufficiently state a claim for a GIPA violation; (2) the defendants had presented no affirmative evidence to support a conclusion that its conduct was inadvertent, and therefore an exception to the GIPA statute; (3) the defendants’ request of genetic information did not fall into the “genetic monitoring” exception of GIPA because the form was silent as to any mention of genetic surveillance and thus employees were unaware they were authorizing genetic monitoring; and (4) the federal Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 did not preempt GIPA as nothing in GIPA’s prohibition on requesting genetic information conflicts with OSHA’s Toxic and Hazardous Substances regulations.

Bowles v. Rush University Medical Center, Northern District of Illinois, No. 25 CV 13531 – in this case, the defendant removed the matter to federal court, claiming the presence of federal question jurisdiction because the plaintiff’s claim was preempted by the Labor Management Relations Act (“LMRA”) because the plaintiff had signed a collective-bargaining agreement. The federal district court denied this argument, refusing to apply prior caselaw finding BIPA claims preempted due to the provision of BIPA allowing for “an authorized agent” to consent to the collection of biometric information. Because GIPA includes no such consent exception, the court held that the reasoning of prior BIPA caselaw finding preemption did not apply, and the LMRA did not preempt the plaintiff’s claim: “GIPA confers a nonnegotiable right to be free from such conditions directly on individual employees, and no reference to the CBA is necessary to determine whether [the defendant] violated this right.”

New class action accuses Ford of improperly requiring job applicants to disclose personal, family medical information | Cook County Record

Lawsuit: Caterpillar violated IL genetic info privacy law by asking workers about family medical history | Cook County Record

Amazon, Ford Prying Into Family Medical Data Sparks Novel Suits (bloomberglaw.com)

Bloomberg noted that GIPA lawsuits filed by Siri & Glimstad are “breathing life into an old, rarely used Illinois privacy law, and employers are taking notice.” One employment defense attorney noted that, after Siri & Glimstad began filing GIPA cases, other firms followed in our footsteps: “Initially all of these new GIPA class action lawsuits were being filed by the same plaintiffs’ firm. And recently we’ve seen GIPA class actions filed by additional firms[.]”

If you live in the Illinois and were asked to disclose your family’s medical history by your employer or a doctor during a work-related medical treatment, please visit https://joinclassactions.com/class_actions/genetic-information-privacy-act-violations-gipa/.

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