Apple has filed a formal objection with a U.S. bankruptcy court to prevent the transfer of customer information as part of RadioShack’s auctioned-off assets, according to a new report from the Dallas Business Journal. In its filing, Apple claims that a reseller agreement it had in place with RadioShack prohibits the company from selling information specific to Apple’s customers, and further claims that such information does not “fall within RadioShack’s estate,” giving it no right to sell the information at all.
AT&T has also filed similar claims, along with the State of Texas; the latter claiming that the sale of customer data would violate the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act and other consumer protection laws. The state filing also points out RadioShack’s online and in-store privacy policies that promised customers that their information would never be sold. The customer information in question allegedly includes up to 117 million customer files, according to the court documents.
Investment firm Standard General won the auction for RadioShack’s assets earlier this week, however while the bankruptcy court has accepted the winning bid, it has not yet granted formal approval for the sale. At this point, the court could conceivably halt the sale entirely, however legal experts believe that it’s more likely that the court would simply exclude the customer info from the assets being transferred to the buyer. The hearing for these claims is expected to occur next week.
