Within the Meta Pixel data packets, the user’s IP address can be used in combination with other user data to identify the individual or household. Because the data is connected to an IP address, the IP address and the appointment information gets delivered to Facebook. On one-third of the websites, Markup researchers found a Facebook tracker, called the Meta Pixel, sending Facebook highly personal healthcare data whenever the user clicked the “schedule appointment” button. In its study, The Markup looked at Newsweek’s top 100 hospitals in America. While many in the cybersecurity industry (including Feroot) have been reminding businesses for a while that improperly placed web trackers have the potential to cause a host of problems, including compliance and regulatory violations, a recent study by The Markup highlighted those risks for a broader audience. Patients claim that the hospitals and Facebook violated their privacy when Facebook began targeting them with advertisements specifically related to their medical conditions. The data being collected and used for target advertising include sensitive patient information, such as health conditions, doctors, medication, IP address, and other data. The plaintiffs in the lawsuit claim that neither the hospitals nor Meta (Facebook) alert patients to the fact that their sensitive health information is being collected and used for advertising or provide user consents for such purposes. The lawsuit alleges that Facebook and the hospitals are engaged in data privacy violations by unlawfully collecting sensitive patient healthcare data and using it for targeted advertising. It seems those creepy and illegal problems have come home to roost, with news this week that plaintiffs have filed a class action lawsuit in the Northern District of California against three entities: Meta (Facebook) and two healthcare facilities (the University of California San Francisco (UCSF) Medical Center and the Dignity Health Medical Foundation). A few weeks ago we wrote about the “creepy, problematic, and potentially illegal” problems associated with web tracker security-in particular, the security risks of Facebook’s Meta Pixel, its ability to collect and use sensitive healthcare data, and the risks of hospital privacy lawsuits.
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