A settlement is in the works for a flat glass manufacturer following a data breach that exposed personal information on thousands of its workers.
According to a preliminary approval order filed on March 17, AGC America Inc. agreed to pay nearly $600k to employees impacted by the data breach after a lawsuit was filed in 2024.The suit stemmed from a cyberattack in December 2023 that allegedly exposed the personal data of 20,951 people. The plaintiff in the suit, Richard Teague, argued that AGC failed to protect secure data, leading to the exposure of Social Security numbers, driver’s license numbers, financial account information associated with direct deposits, passports, payment card numbers and more.
Teague’s complaint alleges that an attacker accessed and acquired files in AGC’s computer systems containing unencrypted private information of employees and sold that data on the dark web.
“Despite the prevalence of public announcements of data breaches and data security compromises, [AGC] failed to take appropriate steps to protect the private information of the plaintiff and class members from being compromised,” the complaint reads.
Teague states that the breach put him and other employees at risk for criminals to open financial accounts in their names, take out loans, file fraudulent tax returns or obtain government benefits.
In the preliminary approval order for the settlement, United States District Judge Victoria Marie Calvert writes that the Court will “likely be able to approve the proposed settlement as fair, reasonable and adequate.”
AGC and a settlement class council created a procedure for those impacted to claim benefits. According to a memorandum filed by Teague on March 13, settlement class members are eligible for monetary loss reimbursements of up to $2,500 per individual, two years of credit monitoring and insurance services.
Those eligible include individuals residing in the U.S. who were sent a notice of the incident indicating their private information may have been impacted. Those excluded include directors of AGC America, its subsidiaries, affiliated companies or entities in which AGC has a controlling interest.
Final approval is expected on July 21, 2026.