The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) on Thursday said it will ban the antivirus giant Avast from selling consumers’ web browsing data to advertisers after Avast claimed its products would prevent its users from online tracking.
Avast also settled the federal regulator’s charges for $16.5 million, which the FTC said will provide redress for Avast’s users whose sensitive browsing data was improperly sold on to ad giants and data brokers.
But the FTC alleged that Avast sold consumers’ browsing data through its now-shuttered subsidiary, Jumpshot, to more than a hundred other companies, making Avast tens of millions of dollars in revenue.
The regulator said that the browsing data that Jumpshot sold revealed consumers’ religious beliefs, health concerns, political leanings, their location, and other sensitive information.
The reports found Jumpshot was also selling access to its users’ click data, including the specific web links that its users were clicking on.
The U.S. Federal Trade Commission has continued its crackdown on data brokers with a settlement banning data aggregation company InMarket from selling consumers’ precise location data.
Texas-based InMarket, which debuted as CheckPoints at TechCrunch Disrupt 2010, provides a marketing platform that collects sensitive consumer data — including location data, purchasing history, and demographic information — which brands and advertising agencies use to facilitate targeted advertising on mobile devices.
Based on the data that InMarket collects, brands can target shoppers who are likely to be low-income millennials or Christian churchgoers, according to the FTC.
In its proposed order unveiled Thursday, the FTC accused InMarket of failing to obtain users’ consent before using their location data for marketing and advertising purposes.
That order marked the first time the regulator struck a deal to prohibit a company from selling sensitive location data.
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