Berlin, Dusseldorf, New York The IG Metall union has sharply criticized the management of the US automaker Tesla after the data leak. “We are calling on Tesla’s top management to immediately and comprehensively inform employees about any violations of their data protection rights,” Dirk Schulze from IG Metall Brandenburg told Handelsblatt. Apparently, employees’ most personal data would be open to every conceivable form of abuse.
The Handelsblatt has evaluated over 100 gigabytes of data that, according to informants, was accessible to many employees on the Tesla systems. These Tesla files contain 23,000 files, including Excel lists that apparently show the salaries and private addresses of more than 100,000 current and former employees. This also includes data from employees at the Grünheide plant in Brandenburg.
Schulze described the revelations as “disturbing”. If management wants to prevent such incidents from happening again, it should promote a corporate culture in which employees can speak up about grievances openly without fear, Schulze said.
The trade unionist campaigned for IG Metall, which had hardly been able to gain a foothold at Tesla: “As in all other companies, the same applies to Tesla: self-confident and unionized workforces are best able to ensure that their rights are protected.”
Employees are unsettled, Tesla is silent
In Grünheide, employees waited in vain for a statement from their employer on Friday. “There was no information from Tesla, just nothing,” said an employee of the Handelsblatt. Tesla behaved as if nothing had happened.” But he didn’t expect anything else. “The group finds it difficult to communicate unpleasant things openly and transparently,” said the employee, who wished to remain anonymous.
The exchange between the employees was all the more intensive for this. “We were very surprised by the reporting and are now unsettled,” said the employee. He himself used the tool provided by the Handelsblatt to ask whether his data was affected. “It looks like my data has been leaked, all of it,” he shared. Accordingly, contract, identity, contact and salary data are affected.
I’m now wondering what I can and will do, but I have to let the whole thing sink in first. An anonymous Tesla employee
In an interview, he then confirmed the specific information available to the editors about his starting date, job description, salary and home address. “I’m now wondering what I can and will do, but I have to let the whole thing sink in first.”
Numerous other employees and customers are now in contact with the editors. Most are interested in more information about the data that concerns them and asked questions about it. Others asked the Handelsblatt to delete their data from Tesla files.
Legal service providers position themselves for possible lawsuits
Meanwhile, the first legal service providers are already sensing a deal and are positioning themselves for possible claims for damages against Tesla. The European Society for Data Protection (EuGD) has set up a page where it offers customers and employees affected by the alleged data protection violations to consider claims for damages. The company regularly conducts procedures related to data leaks.
Among other things, EuGD initiated several test cases against the company after a data leak at the credit card provider Mastercard. At the beginning of this year, the disputes ended with a settlement, Mastercard offered 2,000 customers 400 euros in damages.
At the request of the Handelsblatt, Tesla has so far refused to comment on the data leak. The US company asks the Handelsblatt to send Tesla a copy of the data and then to delete all other copies immediately. Tesla suspects an employee of abusing his access as a service technician “to exfiltrate information”. The carmaker also said: “As you know, the use of illegally obtained data for media reporting is only permitted under exceptional circumstances.” The Handelsblatt considers these circumstances to be given.
International media have now also picked up the reporting on a large scale, especially in Tesla’s home market of the USA. TV channels such as CNBC and CNN reported, Wired magazine and the Los Angeles Times discussed the files extensively.
Los Angeles Times journalist Russ Mitchell also publicly followed up with Tesla boss Elon Musk via the social media channel Twitter: “Hey Elon Musk, is there a comment on the thousands of security complaints that the Handelsblatt has reported and to Tesla’s instructions to employees to avoid written records?
He also raised the question: “When will the regulatory authorities act?” The US consumer protection authority, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), meanwhile, did not want to comment on inquiries from the Handelsblatt about whether it was dealing with the alleged data protection violations.
In the past, the authority had imposed sometimes drastic sanctions for serious data protection violations. The Facebook parent company had to pay the record fine of five billion US dollars in 2020.
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