Californians accuse PG&E of violating privacy by routing calls through AI

The utility's customers say their sensitive information, such as Social Security numbers and financial details, was transcribed by a third party without disclosure or their consent.(CN) — Five California residents say in a class action that Pacific Gas and Electric Company use an artificial intelligence answering service to address customer phone calls in violation of state privacy laws.“​​This is not a case about website cookies, pixels or analytics software,” the plaintiffs write in the complaint. “It concerns the surreptitious, real-time wiretapping, eavesdropping upon, and recording of ordinary telephone calls — the precise conduct [California Invasion of Privacy Act] was enacted to prohibit.”The five plaintiffs, who are PG&E customers, say the utility provider uses a company called PolyAI Technologies to answer incoming calls. Each call connects to a computer system that introduces itself as “Peggy, PG&E’s virtual assistant.” Peggy is an artificial intelligence answering service product designed by PolyAI to answer and transcribe incoming calls.The plaintiffs claim the customer calls are transmitted to and processed on PolyAI’s platform rather than PG&E’s without the caller being aware. They also claim PolyAI reserves the right to keep and use the calls intended for the utility company.“No caller is told any of this,” the plaintiffs write, adding that the utility company’s recorded greeting only says the call may be recorded and to let the agent know if they don’t want to be recorded.“It does not say that the ‘agent’ is a machine operated by another company, that the call is being connected to that company’s servers, that the company is listening to and transcribing every word, or that the company may keep the caller’s voice and use it to build and sell its own products.”If a caller does object to their call being recorded, they cannot lodge that objection without first speaking to Peggy. The plaintiffs claim this means that by the time the objection is made, PolyAI has already received, analyzed and acted upon the caller’s voice.“Consent that can be withheld only after the interception has begun is not prior consent,” the plaintiffs write.The plaintiffs also name PolyAI as a defendant in the complaint, filed Friday in Alameda County. PG&E provides service to over five million customers in the northern two-thirds of California and its customer service phone lines receive approximately 16 million calls a year.“PG&E, for its part, selected PolyAI, connected its telephone lines to PolyAI’s platform, scripted a greeting that conceals PolyAI’s existence, directed callers to a privacy policy that contradicts PolyAI’s actual practices, and allowed PolyAI to feature PG&E as a marquee customer,” the plaintiffs wrote.The plaintiffs say PG&E’s privacy policy doesn’t mention its use of AI or that any entity other than the utility company may use call recordings. Rather, the plaintiffs contend the company promises its service providers “must also not use your personal information for any purpose other than that for which it was given.”“Through the real-time wiretapping, eavesdropping and recording alleged herein, defendants violated and continue to violate the California Invasion of Privacy Act,” the plaintiffs wrote.The plaintiffs seek to represent a class of California residents and PG&E customers whose calls were answered by Peggy and therefore intercepted, recorded or transcribed by PolyAI.“Plaintiffs and class members disclosed to PolyAI, without knowing it, information of the most sensitive kind: their names linked to their home addresses and telephone numbers; their PG&E account and meter numbers; their Social Security numbers; their payment-card and bank-account information; the fact and circumstances of outages, gas leaks, and other conditions at their homes; and, for many, information about household medical needs and financial hardship,” the plaintiffs wrote.The plaintiffs are asking the court to find the companies violated the California Invasion of Privacy Act and to award $5,000 per violation. They also want an order requiring the defendants to permanently delete all recordings and transcripts derived from the intercepted calls.Neither Pacific Gas and Electric Company nor PolyAI responded to a request for comment before press time.Subscribe to our free newslettersOur weekly newsletter Closing Arguments offers the latest about ongoing trials, major litigation and rulings in courthouses around the U.S. and the world, while the monthly Under the Lights dishes the legal dirt from Hollywood, sports, Big Tech and the arts.Additional Reads