Employee in the Move v. CoStar case allegedly caused $5,000 in damages
After two of his claims against CoStar Group laid off at the end of October, the parent company of Realtor.com is at it again. On Tuesday, Move Inc. filed a second amended complaint in his ongoing battle with the Homes.com parent company.
Like the first amended complaint, the second contains six claims against CoStar. In the latest filing, Move seeks to plug holes in the two claims dismissed by Judge George H. Wu of the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles.
The two dismissed claims alleged violations of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, as well as the Comprehensive Computer Data Access and Fraud Act, the plaintiffs’ two statutory claims to federal and state trade secrecy. Both claims were against CoStar and James Kaminsky, the former Realtor.com employee at the center of the legal battle.
The lawsuit was initially filed by Move in July and centers on Kaminsky, a former Realtor.com employee who joined CoStar-backed Homes.com after being fired by the Move subsidiary. In the lawsuit, Move alleges that Kaminsky stole documents and trade secrets from Realtor.com, which he then provided to CoStar to fuel Homes.com’s rapid growth.
In its amended complaint, Move noted that it “incurred costs in excess of $5,000 as a result of Mr. Kaminsky’s unauthorized access to Move’s protected computer systems.”
“The infiltration of Move’s internal systems disrupted and had an economic impact on the company, its workforce and its operations,” the filing said. “Since the first day that Mr. Kaminsky’s unauthorized digital presence was discovered in Move’s confidential business documents, Move employees, including some in management and leadership positions, have had to spend part of their work hours addressing, investigating and resolve this vulnerability. The investigation distracted these employees from their regular business activities.”
Move also noted that it has retained a forensic expert to investigate the extent of Kaminsky’s access to documents and assess any alleged harm he may have caused. Move said the forensic expert found that Kaminsky had “deleted nearly a thousand electronic files from his Move laptop and deleted his entire browsing history, irretrievably destroying those files and data.”
Move also noted that while CoStar has insisted that Kaminsky has committed no wrongdoing, CoStar has so far refused to “produce for Move the forensic images they captured of Mr. Kaminsky’s CoStar-issued computer equipment, which Mr. Kaminsky allegedly used during the time he unlawfully accessed Move’s confidential and trade secret information.”
Of the other four claims in the filing, two were against CoStar and Kaminsky and related to misappropriation of trade secrets. The two other claims were directed solely against Kaminsky and allege breach of contract and promissory note fraud.
In an emailed statement, a Realtor.com spokesperson said the company looks forward to its day in court.
“We have amended our complaint based on the judge’s guidelines and are now moving forward with all six of our original claims,” the spokesperson wrote.
For their part, CoStar and its general counsel Gene Boxer still claim the lawsuit is a “sham.”
“The court has already rejected Move’s claims once and rejected Move’s request for an injunction. Move’s amended complaint does not resolve the fundamental issues in this case and is simply another transparent attempt to lash out at Homes.com, which has outpaced Move’s website in the marketplace,” Boxer wrote in an email.
“Agents love Homes.com and the ‘your listing, your lead’ model. Realtor.com’s approach to diverting leads is bad for agents and bad for consumers. Move should focus on fixing its broken business model and spend its legal fees defending the class action lawsuit accusing Realtor.com of selling fake leads to real estate agents.”
