Google and Facebook’s new tactic in the tech wars

Fortune discusses the problem with cy pres awards and references Ted Frank for more details.

The key recurring concern with any class action settlement is that plaintiffs attorneys, desiring to maximize their fees, and defendant corporations, eager to minimize total payout, will collude to achieve their goals at the expense of class members. Cy pres awards can be enlisted in that abusive process, attorney Theodore H. Frank of the Center for Class Action Fairness, has written, by “disguising the true cost of a settlement to the defendant to maximize the share of the actual recovery received by the plaintiffs attorneys.”

Read the full article at Fortune.