A class action lawsuit was filed in 2011 against a leading technology security provider and its e-commerce vendor on behalf of customers who purchased Extended Download Service and Download Insurance for security software products. In 2014, a judge in the U.S. District Court for the District of Minnesota, certified the case as a national class action and, in 2015, the judge granted preliminary approval of a class action settlement. The settlement created a fund of $60 million to compensate those who purchased the download insurance.
Applied Marketing Science (AMS) survey expert Steven Gaskin conducted a study on behalf of the plaintiffs to support the damages claim. To perform this analysis, AMS used choice-based conjoint analysis (CBC), a survey technique in which consumers are asked to trade off various product options they could consider in the buying situation. Choice-based conjoint analysis made it possible to calculate the difference in value between a product having a specific feature and a product lacking the feature.