Ameritrade spam lawsuit - $2m for lawyers, little for claimants
Ameritrade had a breach of its accounts where a spammer got at least e-mail addresses from customers.  I first noticed this a few years ago when I got stock spam through unique e-mail addresses assigned to my investment account.  After I blogged about it, a few dozen people verified the problem and lawyers started asking me to become a class representative.<p>I passed, but noticed a proposed settlement the other day:
http://www.stockspamsettlement.com/notice.html<p>The class members get free security software for one year.  Ameritrade makes donations totaling $55,000 to anti-spam organizations.  The two class representatives get $1,000 each, if approved by the court.<p>The lawyers are requesting about $1.9 million and Ameritrade will not oppose the request, so nearly all of the damages will pay for attorneys' fees.  Not surprising.<p>Our legal system in action :/