LinkedIn users are used to getting way too many LinkedIn emails, but they received one tonight that was much different than usual: LinkedIn was announcing that it had agreed to settle a class-action lawsuit over sending unwanted emails. The lawsuit revolves around LinkedIn's Add Connections feature, which would send out connection requests to people in a user's contact list who did not already have a LinkedIn account. Users had to agree to send out that first connection request, but LinkedIn would then follow up with up to two more "reminder emails" if there was no response. The lawsuit alleges that users did not consent to LinkedIn sending those additional emails, nor give LinkedIn permission to use their names and images in them.

It'll pay out $13 million and let users cancel reminder emails

LinkedIn denies all wrongdoing. Nonetheless, it has agreed to a settlement that'll have it paying at least $13 million into a fund to make payments to LinkedIn users who qualify for the suit. In general, those people will have had accounts on LinkedIn between September 2011 and October 2014 and sent emails through the Add Connections feature. Additionally, LinkedIn will change the disclosures on its website to mention the additional reminder emails. It will also add a feature by year's end that'll allow users to cancel the reminder emails from being sent.

In a statement provided to Business Insider, LinkedIn tries to make it sound like literally nothing is even happening:

LinkedIn recently settled a lawsuit concerning its Add Connections product. In the lawsuit, a number of false accusations were made against LinkedIn. Based on its review of LinkedIn's product, the court agreed that these allegations were false and found that LinkedIn's members gave permission to share their email contacts with LinkedIn and to send invitations to connect on LinkedIn. Because the court also suggested that we could be more clear about the fact that we send reminder emails about pending invitations from LinkedIn members, we have made changes to our product and privacy policy. Ultimately, we decided to resolve this case so that we can put our focus where it matters most: finding additional ways to improve our members' experiences on LinkedIn. In doing so, we will continue to be guided by our core value — putting our members first.

While it's true that the court didn't see any issues with the initial emails sent out through LinkedIn's Add Connections feature, it actually found that users may have been harmed by the second and third emails. That's probably why LinkedIn has decided to go ahead and pay out $13 million in a settlement. The settlement must still be approved in court; information for LinkedIn users can be found at a settlement website. Either way it goes, this is still some amount of vindication for the ubiquitous complaint that LinkedIn sends way, way, way too many unwanted emails.

The core of the email LinkedIn is sending out is reprinted below. All emphasis is from LinkedIn: