Illinois resident’s class-action lawsuit alleges Claude chatbot violates state privacy law
A class-action lawsuit was filed against Anthropic by Illinois resident Jose Enrique Oriz Colon, alleging the company’s Claude chatbot violated the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA) by requiring users to submit a government ID and a “live image” of their face for identity verification without proper written disclosure.
Colon claims Anthropic failed to provide the required written notification about how long it would retain his biometric data and had no public policy on when such data would be permanently destroyed, both of which are mandatory under Illinois law.
The lawsuit details that Colon was locked out of his Claude account until he complied with verification from Chicago, which involved photographing his driver’s license and then having his face captured by an on-screen camera, with Anthropic using a vendor to confirm his identity.
The biometric lawsuit is the latest in a series of legal challenges for Anthropic, following a $1.5 billion settlement with authors and a June 2025 ruling that allowed a trial to proceed over the company’s “criminal-level” theft of over seven million pirated books for training Claude.
The case highlights the growing tension between AI companies’ security measures and state privacy protections, with state laws like BIPA becoming key tools for individuals to challenge corporate data collection as federal privacy legislation remains stalled.
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