"Here at [Institution], we take your privacy very seriously" OH NO WHAT DID YOU DO?
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Justin Brookman
@JustinBrookman
Head of tech policy for Consumer Reports (), ex-, ex-, ex-NYAG, ex-BigLaw. Occasionally UVa sports too. Tweets are my own.
Washington, DCJoined April 2010
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It's especially gratifying that this case came out of a investigation conducted by (with help from ). They uncovered a lot of dodgy stuff and laid out a great fact pattern. Well done!
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And as Ben points out, at least GoodRx can't even ask for consent. The FTC is imposing a blanket prohibition on sharing health data for ad targeting for the company going forward (which is the right policy anyway).
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The @FTC's order against @GoodRx includes a flat-out ban against selling user health data to 3rd parties in the future. This is the kind of conduct-changing remedy that has been hard to obtain in past cases (and why unfairness can be such a powerful tool). twitter.com/benrossen/stat…
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Punting everything to consent can be problematic if it just means blanket permissions in EULAs or annoying and confusing interstitials. But I suspect the FTC will have a high bar on what constitutes valid consent for selling or sharing health data.
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The FTC also alleges sharing this data without permission was an "unfair" business practice under Section 5. The logic of this count applies beyond health data, and reflects a broader trend from the FTC and other regulators to cracking down on sharing data for targeted ads.
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The FTC previously signaled this direction with an updated Policy Statement in 2021. In addition to articulating a clear prohibition on sharing health data, invoking the HBNR means the FTC can get massive fines for violations.
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Privacy people talk about the HIPAA cliff (or gap) --- medical providers have rules under HIPAA but apps and websites aren't covered. But the FTC is using other legal authorities to impose strict protections. To wit:
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This case is really a huge deal. For years, we've read stories of health apps sharing data with G/FB/data brokers.
With this case, the FTC is saying that apps sharing personal health data without explicit permission violates the Health Breach Notification Rule.
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!!!
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The FTC fined GoodRx today based on a story I broke at @ConsumerReports. We caught GoodRx secretly sending your prescription data to Facebook and Google. Now, the FTC says that’s illegal.
For the first time, we may have real health privacy the US. gizmodo.com/ftc-fines-good
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I've been going in pretty hard on and @jbrowder1 for the past couple of days, and I've had a lot of people defending the service, saying that it could be a real boon to those who can't otherwise afford legal aid.
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New York Attorney General sues Celsius CEO Alex Mashinksy for defrauding investors
January 5, 2023
web3isgoinggreat.com/?id=new-york-a
![New York Attorney General sues Celsius CEO Alex Mashinksy for defrauding investors As Celsius bankruptcy proceedings continue on, the New York Attorney General has come out with a lawsuit against the company's founder and CEO, Alex Mashinsky. Attorney General Letitia James accuses Mashinsky of "engag[ing] in a scheme to defraud hundreds of thousands of investors", promoting his company as a "safe alternative to banks while concealing that Celsius was actually engaged in risky investment strategies". The lawsuit seeks to permanently bar Mashinsky from engaging in similar business in the state, and seeks disgorgement, damages, and restitution.](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FluLY6HXEAIj7HP?format=jpg&name=large)
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FTC proposes rule to ban noncompete clauses, which hurt workers and harm competition: bit.ly/3QlBVlZ /1
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So to review what made it/didn't make it in the omni:
❌ KOSA
❌ COPPA 2.0
❌ AICOA
❌ OAMA
✅ TikTok ban on gov devices
✅ Merger filing fees bill
✅ State AG venue bill
✅ INFORM
Full text here: appropriations.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/
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Sorry, to clarify, chat-is-unfair was brought under Section 5 (unfair and deceptive practices) not COPPA. I had just meant to distinguish the two separate complaints (one on special treatment of kids/teens, one on fraudulent billing practices).
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Fortnite also appears to engaged in a number of more prosaic COPPA violations too, but chat-is-unfair is the most interesting part of the COPPA settlement. Well, that and the sheer amount of the fine.
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It's also interesting the FTC was able to negotiate hundreds in millions in refunds for ripped off customers despite AMG Capital Management.
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Fortnite also appears to engaged in a number of more prosaic COPPA violations too, but chat-is-unfair is the most interesting part of the COPPA settlement. Well, that and the sheer amount of the fine.
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Fortnite knows they have a ton of children on the service, but they don't necessarily know which users are kids. Given that, the FTC alleges that connecting all users to live chat by default is an unfair and harmful business practice.
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Anyway, we've been asking IAB to reverse course on this for years now, so credit where credit is due: better late than never!
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In which we urge @IAB to abandon its efforts to define ad tech data sharing as outside the scope of CCPA's protections. advocacy.consumerreports.org/wp-content/upl
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And as has noted, it's odd that IAB now claims it is *obvious* such data sharing is a sale when the IAB's Multi-State Privacy Agreement still allows members to adopt a contrary interpretation.
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To be clear, for the past few several years, IAB's position has been that members were free to say that sharing data for ad targeting wasn't a "sale" under the CCPA or similar laws.
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lol, it took them a while to get there, but has finally admitted that state privacy laws apply to targeted advertising. iapp.org/news/a/cross-c
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This would likely violate the California Consumer Privacy Act, as well as privacy laws in Connecticut and Colorado that go into effect next year.
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NEW: Twitter has a plan to force you to opt in to personalized ads to continue using this app. @ZoeSchiffer and me in @platformer:
platformer.news/p/twitters-ris
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Free speech unless you track oligarchs & billionaires.
Takeaways:
1️⃣ Twitter is making policy decisions on the fly
2️⃣ In ways that align with Musk's well-known interests
Yes this is exactly the critique Elon came in with.
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It appears that all automated flight tracking accounts utilizing open source data from @ADSBexchange have been banned from Twitter, including @RUOligarchJets.
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This is pretty obviously a pretextual policy they haven't thought through and couldn't possibly generally enforce. Think for ten seconds about all the ways we routinely share publicly available information that would reveal a person's location.
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Update, Twitter has changed their policy on open source flight tracking-
help.twitter.com/en/rules-and-p
“Under this policy, you can’t share the following types of private information, without the permission of the person who it belongs to:”
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NEW PODCAST: is doing interesting work with data subject requests.
With industry partners, they're incubating the open-sourced Data Rights Protocol and developing an authorized agent for CCPA/CPRA called Permission Slip.
bit.ly/3FjvPh7
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So Tesla has diverted a bunch of its employees to Twitter and also Tesla's stock is down a lot beyond the market since Musk took over Twitter and why isn't there a lawsuit by Tesla shareholders alleging Musk is benefitting Twitter/himself at the expense of shareholders?
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Great to testify at the Senate Antitrust Subcommittee on the competitive impact of the proposed Kroger Albertsons merger on behalf of - as I say we are skeptical of the claimed benefits of this merger
My opening statement:
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You can't deny 's dedication to his craft of bullshitting customers about Tesla's self-driving timeline (Via ) motherfrunker.ca/fsd/
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In case you're too nervous to watch the second half of USA-Iran, watch my colleague testify on the Albertsons-Kroger merger, explaining why it's likely to lead to higher prices, fewer choices, and reduced access to stores.
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FTC, seven states sue Google and iHeartMedia for deceptive ads promoting the Pixel 4 smartphone:
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2-0 to Ecuador at half time.
Qatar need three goals....and they are:
Women's Equality
Gay Rights
Humanitarian Working Conditions.
My name is Ben Elton - goodnight!
#QatarWorldCup2022
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FIFA makes the NFL look like Doctors Without Borders.
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He presumably hasn’t thought this all out, but does this mean “negative” tweets are yanked from chronological feeds (as implied by the third sentence) or just not amplified by the algorithm (as implied by the second sentence)?
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New Twitter policy is freedom of speech, but not freedom of reach.
Negative/hate tweets will be max deboosted & demonetized, so no ads or other revenue to Twitter.
You won’t find the tweet unless you specifically seek it out, which is no different from rest of Internet.
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NEW from : Our ambitious, crowd-sourced Fight for Fair Internet project analyzed more than 22,000 bills and found that complex pricing and arbitrary, mandatory junk fees make it hard for consumers to understand the true cost of broadband.
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Tesla, Mercedes EVs ranked worst in annual reliability survey by Consumer Reports reut.rs/3Ev4nwv
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Protocol did great work and has some of the most thoughtful and talented tech journalists out there --- you should hire them!
(and many others I'm forgetting)
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