Another lawsuit has been filed against Volkwagen U.S. pertaining to the emissions scandal. This one isn’t on behalf of an upset car owner, though. This time a former VW employee is suing over data deletion. Specifically, that he lost his job due to his efforts to stop the company from deleting data illegally.
Another lawsuit has been filed against Volkwagen U.S. pertaining to the emissions scandal. This one isn’t on behalf of an upset car owner, though. This time a former VW employee is suing over data deletion. Specifically, that he lost his job due to his efforts to stop the company from deleting data illegally.
The company’s data processing center is located in Michigan and the former VW employee is claiming protection against VW retaliation in accordance with a Michigan whistleblower law.
The unnamed employee claims he was fired from his job at the data processing center for his efforts, begun on September 18, 2015, to stop a co-worker from deleting data. The damages his suit seeks are currently unavailable. German newspaper, Sueddeutsche Zeitung and broadcasters NDR and WDR are jointly covering the issue.
While it is not yet known as fact what data was being deleted, reports say that the former VW data center employee alleges in his suit that VW U.S. was destroying evidence pertaining to the emissions scandal. The German media reports that the data deletion occurred after the U.S. Department of Justice ordered the company to cease any “routine” data deletion at VW U.S.
Volkswagen is already facing a number of lawsuits, as well as regulatory investigations, over the emissions cheating scandal According to a German spokesperson for the company, “These are legal proceedings concerning labor law on which we don’t comment as a matter of principle.”
Media reports also say that, according to the former VW employee, he was following his manager’s instructions by attempting to halt the data deletions. However, the former employee said that there was an argument about the issue and that the company’s worries that he would tell the authorities of the data deletions led to the loss of his job.
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