Mercor Faces Seven Class-Action Lawsuits Over Data Monitoring and Facial Data Leak

ME News reports that, as of April 23 (UTC+8), according to monitoring by Beating, AI data labeling outsourcing company Mercor has faced at least seven class-action lawsuits in recent weeks due to a third-party data breach. Headquartered in San Francisco and valued at $10 billion, Mercor serves clients including OpenAI, Anthropic, and Meta, with its core business involving hiring freelance workers to provide feedback data for AI training. The leaked data includes recorded job interviews, facial biometric information, and computer screenshots. A class-action lawsuit filed on Tuesday in Northern California alleges that Mercor collected background check data from job applicants and shared it with partners, violating federal regulations. Plaintiffs also accuse Mercor of monitoring freelancers’ computers, sharing data with clients, using recorded interviews to train AI models, and training client models with materials potentially belonging to other companies. Mercor denies all allegations, stating it complies with all relevant regulations and has engaged third-party forensic experts to investigate the breach. One plaintiff, former Goldman Sachs employee David Bevvino-Berv, reported seeing financial models and prompts during his time at Mercor that contained indicators such as institutional data terminal labels and real counterparty names, suggesting they originated from proprietary information belonging to other companies. Another plaintiff, Thitipun Srinarmwong, said project managers encouraged workers to use real data from their primary jobs, provided it was anonymized; when he deliberately obscured details to protect confidential information, reviewers criticized his submissions as “too short and too vague.” Mercor requires freelancers to install the screenshot software Insightful, which freelancers say captures screenshots once per minute. Bevvino-Berv stated that Insightful captured usage screens from approximately 240 applications—including his bank accounts and health insurance portals—without prior disclosure that the monitoring would extend beyond Mercor-related work. Meta has suspended its partnership with Mercor and initiated an investigation. In 2025, Mercor employed 30,000 freelance workers. (Source: BlockBeats)