It does not come as a surprise to academic experts in legal strategy that the parent company of the Ashley Madison dating website wanted to settle the well-publicized case. In fact, William H.J. Hubbard, a professor at the University of Chicago Law School, said the “settlement was probably inevitable in this case.”

“In a highly publicized, class action lawsuit involving sensitive information for all parties involved, settlement is basically a foregone conclusion,” Hubbard told Legaltech News. “The defendant wants to settle because the data breach was a PR nightmare, and it wants to put the fiasco in the rearview mirror. The plaintiffs and class members presumably want as much confidentiality as possible, too, for obvious reasons. And the lawyers representing the class, who wield tremendous discretion and influence, given that the class is a diffuse group of individuals whose stakes are small relative to the case as a whole, want to make sure they get paid, and a class action settlement will inevitably provide for that.”

The settlement relates to the class action lawsuit filed following a data breach and release of personal information from customers of Ashley Madison, an online dating website owned and operated by Ruby Life Inc.