Data for Sale: Tips to Help Protect Your Private Information

Recent action by the Federal Trade Commission highlights the potential for abuse by online data brokers.  This week, Craig Siminski, of CMS Retirement Income Planning, shares with us an article discussing some tips that might help consumers keep their private data private:

On December 3, 2024, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) announced a proposed settlement in legal action against a data broker named Mobilewalla, which was accused of using location data obtained through online advertising auctions to identify consumers by factors such as private home address and visits to health-care clinics and churches.

In an online auction, a data broker bids to place “real-time” ads for its clients on a consumer’s cell phone or other mobile device, based on consumer data shared in the auction, which typically includes a unique mobile advertising identifier (MAID) and the consumer’s location at the time of the auction. The FTC alleged that Mobilewalla retained data regardless of whether or not it won the auction and made no reasonable effort to determine if consumers had given permission to use their data.

According to the complaint, between January 2018 and June 2020, Mobilewalla collected more than 500 million MAID/location pairings and sold the raw data to advertisers, data brokers, and analytics firms. The company also used the data to create audience segments for their clients by processing it through virtual “geofences” around specific sites. For example, MAIDs that appeared within geographic coordinates around pregnancy centers were used to build audience segments targeting pregnant women. Other targeted sites included churches, labor offices…

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Craig Siminski is a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™ professional, with more than 25 years of experience. His goal is to provide families, business owners, and their employees with assistance in building their financial freedom.

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