Washington: The US Federal Trade Commission The Idaho-based data broker was sued on Monday Kochwa Inc. to sell geolocation data from millions of mobile devices that can be used to track consumers.
This FTC Consumer data can be used to trace people’s movements to and from sensitive locations, including “reproductive health clinics, places of worship, homeless and domestic violence shelters, and addiction recovery facilities.” Kochava responded by calling the FTC action “frivolous.”
The issue gained interest after the Supreme Court ruling in June overturned the Roe v. Wade decision that guaranteed the constitutional right to abortion for decades. The technology industry has feared police or other organizations could access consumers’ search history, geolocation and other information that reveals pregnancy plans.
“The FTC has a fundamental misunderstanding of Cochava’s data marketplace business and other data businesses. Cochava operates consistently and proactively in compliance with all regulations and laws,” said Brian Cox, general manager of Cochava.
Kochava said it has been negotiating with the FTC for weeks and recently announced work to block geolocation data from sensitive locations.
The lawsuit seeks to block Kochava’s sale of sensitive geolocation data and require the company to delete the sensitive geolocation information it has collected.
“Where consumers seek health care, receive counseling or exercise their faith is private information that should not be sold to the highest bidder,” said FTC Director Samuel Levin. Bureau of Consumer Protection. “FTC is taking Kochava to court to protect people’s privacy.”
The FTC said Kochava purchases vast amounts of location information from other data brokers on millions of mobile devices that are packaged into customized data. They then sell that data to customers, including retailers looking at foot traffic.
The FTC alleges that Kochava failed to adequately protect its data from public exposure and, at least until June, “allowed anyone with little effort to obtain a large sample of sensitive data and use it without restriction.”
Democratic Senator Ron Wyden praised the FTC action, saying it was “working to protect Americans from shady data brokers trying to sell private reproductive data for profit post-Raw America.”
The Cochava data the FTC reviewed “consists of precise, timestamped location data collected from more than 61 million unique mobile devices during the previous week.”
The FTC lawsuit said consumers can subscribe to the Cochava data feed through the Amazon Web Services marketplace until June. The FTC lawsuit said Kochava asserted that it offered “rich geo data spanning billions of devices globally.”
In July, Alphabet’s Google said it would delete location data it shows when people visit abortion clinics, a digital trail that could alert law enforcement if someone illegally terminates a pregnancy.
Earlier this month, the FTC said it was considering writing rules to better protect Americans’ privacy and crack down on businesses that collect far-reaching personal information without consumers’ full knowledge.
