Congress correspondent Chad Pergram reveals who, according to the GOP, is the only person responsible for the Supreme Court’s abortion decision.
Democrat senators Elizabeth Warren, Ron Wyden, Corey Booker and Sarah Jacobs have called on the Federal Trade Commission to investigate Apple and Google for failing to warn consumers of the potential harm of ad-specific tracking IDs in their mobile operating systems.
“These identifiers fuel the market for unregulated data intermediaries by creating unique device-related information that data brokers and their customers can use to link to other consumer data,” lawmakers wrote in a letter Friday. “This data is purchased or acquired by application developers and online advertisers and may include user movements and web browsing activity.”
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Although consumers may opt out of tracking, they claim that Apple and Google “enabled governments and private actors to use ad tracking systems for their own surveillance and exposed hundreds of millions of Americans to serious damage to privacy.”
“The FTC should explore the role of Apple and Google in transforming online advertising into an intensive surveillance system that encourages and facilitates the unrestricted collection and ongoing sale of personal data to Americans,” the letter continued. “These companies have failed to inform consumers about the privacy and security risks associated with the use of these products. It is time to put an end to the damage to confidentiality imposed on consumers by these companies. “
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The letter places particular emphasis on the potential vulnerability of those seeking abortion and other reproductive health care following the Supreme Court’s decision Friday to overturn Rowe against Wade.
“Data brokers are already selling, licensing and sharing location information to people who visit abortion providers with credit cards,” lawmakers said. “Prosecutors in states where abortion is illegal will soon be able to obtain orders for the location of anyone who has visited an abortion provider. access to location information through shadow data brokers. “
A Google spokesman told FOX Business that the company “never sells user data” and that Google Play strictly prohibits the sale of user data by developers.
“The ad identifier is designed to give users more control and give developers a more personal way to effectively generate revenue from their applications,” added the technology giant. “Any claim that the ad ID was created to facilitate data sales is simply false.”
In addition to the ability to delete an ad ID at any time, Google has introduced Privacy Sandbox on Android to restrict data sharing with third parties. An Apple spokesman did not immediately respond to FOX Business’s request for comment.
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The Electronic Frontier Foundation, a San Francisco-based digital privacy group, advises Internet users who are concerned about their abortion-related data to carefully review the privacy settings of the services they use, to turn off location services in applications. who do not need them. and use encrypted messaging services.
“Everyone deserves to have strong control over the collection and use of information that they always leave behind while performing their usual activities, such as using applications, search engine queries, posting on social media, sending text messages to friends and so on. EFF CEO Cindy Cohn and Legal Director Corinne McSherry said in a statement. “But those seeking, offering or facilitating access to abortion must now accept that any data they provide online or offline can be sought by law enforcement.
It also suggests that companies must protect consumers by allowing anonymous access, stopping behavioral tracking, strengthening data deletion policies, offering end-to-end and transit encryption, preventing location tracking, and ensuring that users are notified when their data is searched.
The organization also calls on state and federal politicians to pass meaningful privacy laws.
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At least 13 states in the country have the so-called “trigger laws” a ban on most abortions that will take effect immediately or within weeks of Rowe’s cancellation against Wade.
According to the Guttmacher Institute, an abortion rights research group, these states are Arkansas, Idaho, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah and Wyoming, which have just passed their trigger. . law in April.
There are five additional states – Alabama, Arizona, Michigan, West Virginia and Wisconsin – that still have a ban on abortions from books before Rowe against Wade, which will take effect now that the remarkable 1973 law was repealed.
Jessica Chasmar of Fox News contributed to this report
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