Class-action suit against AI chatbot Luda developer joined by over 300 victims

Alleged privacy infringement victims of South Korea’s now temporarily suspended artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot service Lee Luda (Luda) are set to file a class action against its developer Scatter Lab.

More than 340 people have signed up to join the lawsuit on an online platform, according to sources on Friday. Law firm Taelim that is leading the case said it is closing recruiting and consider whether to recruit more potential victims later.

The alleged victims of privacy infringement requested preservation of evidence to the Seoul Eastern District Court on Thursday for fear of evidence destruction by the company.

Scatter Lab is accused of colleting Kakao Talk chats of dating app users without their consent in establishing a deep learning algorithm for the AI chatbot. It is known to have collected around 10 billion Kakao Talk conversations and used 100 million of them to build the database.

The company that is under a probe by the Personal Information Protection Commission said it would destroy the database once the investigation is over.

It usually takes about a week for the court to decide on whether to accept the request for evidence preservation.

The victims will determine how much they should demand in compensation depending on the investigation result.

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