In a settlement with InMarket Media that forbids the company from selling Americans ‘ precise location data, the U. S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC ) continues to target data brokers.
A Texas-based data aggregation company called InMarket specializes in gathering and analyzing locational information about people. The business collects location data from a variety of sources, including its own applications ( CheckPoints and ListEase ) and numerous third-party apps that use its software development kit ( SDK).
According to the ’s FTC complaint against InMarket Media, the” InMarket Apps have been downloaded onto over 30 million unique devices since 2017.”
The InMarket SDK is also made available to third-party app developers by Respondent, and it has been used in more than 300 of these apps, which have been downloaded onto over 390 million different devices since 2017.
InMarket builds advertising profiles that the company’s customers use to deliver targeted ads in the mobile apps using data gathered from the apps.
According to the FTC complaint, InMarket maintains 2, 000 different “audiences” that tracked people into categories, such as” Christian churchgoers,” “wealthy and not healthy,” and “parents of preschoolers.”
The FTC claims that the people being tracked have n’t given their consent for their private information to be used in targeted advertising on apps that use its SDK.
According to the U.S. agency, many of those third-party apps might not even be aware that their users ‘ location data is combined with data from other sources to produce in-depth profiles.
In the end, the FTC finds InMarket’s five-year data retention policy to be excessive for targeted advertising, greatly increasing the possibility of exposure and misuse.
For all of these reasons, the FTC has taken action against InMarket to stop the abuse from spreading further and to shield American customers from widespread location tracking.
InMarket will also be barred from selling, licensing, transferring, or sharing any good or service that targets or categorizes customers based on private location information, according to the proposed order. reads the FTC announcement and an .
The FTC suggests imposing the following restrictions on InMarket in addition to the prohibition against selling people’s location data:
- Unless given permission or anonymized, delete location information and products.
- Processes for consent withdrawal and data deletion should be made simple.
- Inform customers about FTC actions and provide opt-out/deletion options.
- Only with explicit permission may I collect and use location data.
- To safeguard sensitive location data, develop a program.
- Make sure SDK partners have the right consumer consent.
- enforce a strict data retention and privacy policy.
Check out the document published by FTC , here, for the full details of the proposed order.
The FTC is acting to safeguard people’s location data from data brokers and marketers in this second instance within the past month.
Previously, the U.S. government agency issued a directive prohibiting the sale and licensing of precise location data obtained from both its own and third-party apps using its SDK.