Industry - Enforcement
Executive Summary
The Federal Trade Commission reached a settlement banning data broker Kochava and its subsidiary from selling Americans' precise location data without explicit consent, resolving a 2022 lawsuit that alleged the company sold geolocation information tracking visits to sensitive locations like healthcare clinics and places of worship. Under the proposed court order, Kochava must establish privacy safeguards including a sensitive location data program, verify consumer consent through suppliers, a...
What Happened
The Federal Trade Commission reached a settlement with data broker Kochava and its subsidiary Collective Data Solutions that will ban them from selling Americans' precise location data without explicit consumer consent. This resolves a lawsuit filed in August 2022, in which the FTC alleged Kochava collected and sold geolocation data from hundreds of millions of mobile devices, tracking movements to sensitive locations including mental health facilities, reproductive health clinics, places of worship, and domestic violence shelters. The company had charged clients $25,000 subscription fees for access to this data, which included raw latitude and longitude information covering over 94 billion monthly transactions from approximately 125 million users.
Who Is Affected
Hundreds of millions of mobile device users in the United States are affected, particularly those who visited sensitive locations such as healthcare clinics, addiction recovery facilities, places of worship, and shelters for homeless and domestic violence survivors. According to the FTC, these consumers were unaware their location data was being collected and sold, and had not consented to this practice. The settlement requires Kochava to allow affected individuals to request disclosure of who received their data and to withdraw consent for future sales.
Why It Matters
This settlement represents a significant federal enforcement action against the commercial surveillance industry and establishes binding legal requirements for how data brokers must handle sensitive location information. The case demonstrates regulatory willingness to pursue legal action against companies that profit from tracking individuals to private and vulnerable locations without consent. The order's requirement for affirmative express consent, supplier verification programs, and mandatory incident reporting creates enforceable standards that could influence broader industry practices around location data collection and sales.
What You Should Do
If you are concerned about location tracking, contact Kochava directly to request disclosure of any entities that may have received your precise location data and withdraw consent for future data sales. Review the privacy settings on your mobile device and individual apps to limit location access to only those services you actively use and trust. Consider using your device's location permissions to allow access only while using specific apps rather than continuously in the background. Moving forward, carefully review app permissions before installation and decline location access for apps that do not require it for their core functionality.
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