Survivors Drag DOJ, Google To Court Over Epstein Records
Survivors linked to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein have sued the United States government and Google after confidential victim identities were allegedly exposed in a large online document release tied to the federal investigation into the disgraced financier.
The lawsuit, filed on Thursday, follows the US Department of Justice’s January publication of more than three million pages under the Epstein Files Transparency Act, a release the department said formed part of a broader disclosure effort involving nearly 3.5 million pages, alongside over 2,000 videos and 180,000 images.
According to the plaintiffs, the disclosure wrongly revealed the identities and private information of about 100 survivors who should have remained anonymous. Court filings accused the DOJ of having “outed approximately 100 survivors of the convicted sexual predator, publishing their private information and identifying them to the world.”
The suit further alleged that while the government later acknowledged the release contained material that should not have been published and withdrew some of it, the damage had already spread online. The plaintiffs said “online entities like Google continuously republish it, refusing victim’s pleas to take it down.”
Google, according to the filing, is still said to be surfacing some of the exposed personal details through search results and AI-generated summaries, raising fresh questions about the responsibilities of technology companies once harmful personal data has already entered the public domain.
The controversy has also drawn attention to the scale and sensitivity of the records made public. The New York Times reported that journalists reviewing the material found dozens of nude photographs in the files, some of them showing identifiable faces, further intensifying concerns about the adequacy of the redaction process.
The Justice Department had warned on its Epstein records portal that, given the “volume of information involved”, the site could still contain “non-public personally identifiable information or other sensitive content” that may have been posted inadvertently. The department said members of the public could notify officials if such material was found.
Epstein was convicted in Florida in 2008 for soliciting sex from underage girls, some as young as 14. He died in a New York jail in 2019 while awaiting trial on federal sex trafficking charges.
In the latest case, survivors said the disclosure had triggered renewed trauma and security fears. The filing stated that some victims were now receiving calls, emails and threats, while also facing accusations linking them to Epstein’s crimes despite being among those harmed.
The plaintiffs argued that the federal government violated the Privacy Act of 1974, while Google is accused of invasion of privacy, negligent infliction of emotional distress and unlawful business practices under California law.