A group of LinkedIn users are suing the service for allegedly hacking emails to find contacts to spam with unwarranted emails.

A complaint has been filed before San Jose courts in the United States which claims “Linkedln is able to download these addresses without requesting the password for the external email accounts or obtaining users' consent.”

The complaint argues that LinkedIn’s practice of borrowing users contact lists to generate more users qualifies as hacking because: “the users' email accounts and downloading of all email addresses associated with that users' account is done without clearly notifying the user or obtaining his or her consent.”

Once a contacts list has been siphoned from a users' email account, “endorsement emails” are sent out; “These endorsement emails contain the name and likeness of those existing users from whom Linkedln surreptitiously obtained the list of email addresses,” the document explains.

The complaint against LinkedIn does not provide any specifics on what nefarious techniques might be used to actually accomplish what it claims, aside from accusing the company of sneaking in “if a LinkedIn user leaves an external email account open.”

The social network has strongly decried the accusations as utterly baseless: “LinkedIn is committed to putting out members first, which includes being transparent about how we protect and utilize our members' data,” the company said in a statement over the weekend,

“We believe that the legal claims in this lawsuit are without merit, and we intend to fight it vigorously.”