Twitter to pay $150 million for selling users data for Ads

[Hydrogen]

AFAIK every website and media platform requesting end user agreement to tracking cookies sells user data.

Even state and government sectors like the DMV (department of motor vehicles) have been publicized selling data for millions of citizens.

They should blanket ban the process of collecting user data or leave it unregulated.

Arbitrarily selecting some corporations for punishment while leaving thousands of others unpenalized is a disproportionate approach of addressing the issue.

[DU18]

This is a good move to me because Twitter had been into this for long and they needed to be prosecuted with huge fines that is more than what had been presented in the court of law. I hope this will limit Twitter when it comes to sharing  the privacy of users during ads uses. I think Twitter is not left out here alone but also other social media like Facebook, Instagram etc. It is obvious that there are still other privacy matters like this one that need to be unvealed to the public. The government have to be very serious about this so it will prevent contineous occurrence.

Privacy violations committed by twitter of course have caused distrust of its users over the years, even previous twitter had received a fine of £400,000 in December 2020 for violating the European GDPR data privacy rules, but surprisingly they are now doing the same thing again with using user data for targeted advertising, I think that with this case, social media is indeed not safe a place to save our data, because previously the largest social media in the world, Facebook was also involved in a user data leak scandal and they should be fined around 5 million dollars in 2019.
With 2 cases that hit the 2 largest social media today, of course we as users should be careful in providing our original data to second parties (social media).

[Sir Legend]

I have heard several times from start-up companies claiming that their consumer data was hacked, from the start I believed that it might not have been hacked but sold, it can be seen that email and my mobile phone received offers from insurance, and many services offered and I never knew before.

[ChiBitCTy]

These companies and their privacy are ridiculous and I wish that they would come down harder on them as they all seem to keep doing the same stuff over and over.  Facebook of course being one of if not the worst of all.  I live in Illinois and there was a class action lawsuit recently where many facebook users in Illinois were given around $400-600 dollars.  The thing that sucks is you had to sign up for the suit by a certain point in time which I missed.  Probably because I keep my account deactivated but still, I feel wronged in a way for not being paid that out as they stole my data too.

[add1ct3dd]

I would be happy if some of the money can go to us because it was our data's not and not the one's who sues twitter. Why they are doing this all the time? They accuse and want's to sue's every social media sites for the same reasons. They will say something like this xxx company have been selling the data's and personal information of its users while we the real costumers didn't even worry that much.

I don't know if the old founders of twitter can contribute something for the payment because they controlled twitter for a long time or is the new twitter owners are going to pay all of these charges? That's going to be a bad start then for them.

[Joshapat]

When we register on any site that requires data such as email, mobile phone, even in exchanges today that most must provide data for KYC will make us always worry if the data we provide is sold, anything for money then can make controversy things, and Of the many cases of hack data in many exchanges and sites like Facebook and Twitter, I never verify KYC.

[FanEagle]

I have heard several times from start-up companies claiming that their consumer data was hacked, from the start I believed that it might not have been hacked but sold, it can be seen that email and my mobile phone received offers from insurance, and many services offered and I never knew before.

That is because 99% of the companies that do not charge you anything for using it (like facebook, twitter, instagram, google etcetc) all make money from ads. What does ads achieve? They sell stuff to people who are interested in those things. Like for example my twitter is filled with ads regarding crypto, and all from crypto companies.

Because, twitter basically sold my data to those companies, even if they do not directly give (which OP shows that they actually did) it means that any company could say "people interested in crypto" and twitter will show it to me, hence it is basically selling my data the same way, just not directly.

[Cookdata]

When we register on any site that requires data such as email, mobile phone, even in exchanges today that most must provide data for KYC will make us always worry if the data we provide is sold, anything for money then can make controversy things, and Of the many cases of hack data in many exchanges and sites like Facebook and Twitter, I never verify KYC.

Looking at Twitter situation is different, they don't request for documentation to KYC, so no one will suspect them of selling users data, they requested for email and phone but in your mind, you will think they are doing that to reduce spam and make sure that those who have registered are valid users but it verified real emails and phone numbers are one of the few the most lucrative business on internet, they have people on dark web who are ready to buy this phone numbers and email base on locations on their IP address.

[dunfida]

When we register on any site that requires data such as email, mobile phone, even in exchanges today that most must provide data for KYC will make us always worry if the data we provide is sold, anything for money then can make controversy things, and Of the many cases of hack data in many exchanges and sites like Facebook and Twitter, I never verify KYC.

Looking at Twitter situation is different, they don't request for documentation to KYC, so no one will suspect them of selling users data, they requested for email and phone but in your mind, you will think they are doing that to reduce spam and make sure that those who have registered are valid users but it verified real emails and phone numbers are one of the few the most lucrative business on internet, they have people on dark web who are ready to buy this phone numbers and email base on locations on their IP address.

Every information that you had able to put online will really reflect out or would really be in connection on legit users/persons which could really be used on other means and its not surprising that these platforms

would really be attached or tagged on such issue on selling out personal users data and there's nothing we can do about it yet we had provided them since from the start on using their platform from emails to phone

numbers which same as you said that these these are valuable these days which high tendency or chances for it to be sold in unknown markets.

[RealMalatesta]

I would be happy if some of the money can go to us because it was our data's not and not the one's who sues twitter. Why they are doing this all the time? They accuse and want's to sue's every social media sites for the same reasons. They will say something like this xxx company have been selling the data's and personal information of its users while we the real costumers didn't even worry that much.

I don't know if the old founders of twitter can contribute something for the payment because they controlled twitter for a long time or is the new twitter owners are going to pay all of these charges? That's going to be a bad start then for them.

This is what bothers me the most. By this logic the ones who got our data made profit, the ones who sold our data made profit, the ones who punished twitter got profit, and even though it is our data that caused all of us this, none of us got any money at all.

Makes no sense to me to be fair, I would like to see some of that money because all of this money was made based on my data, my information, all the things related to me but I am the only one who didn't make a single dollar out of it. Even if it is just 10 cents, it should be given out to each person that data included, it is not about the money but more about the notion behind it.

[nurilham]

That's why having a social media account will risking your KYC,.I have an accounts before, but I decided to delete it all and only become a guest if I want to read any posts or news on there.

I am starting to worry about my data, to be honest I have some social media accounts. I've FB account, Twitter account, Instagram account, and some other social media accounts. Unfortunately, these accounts are created for important purposes such as job requirements. Should I delete all my social media accounts, brother?

Once personal data is shared, it should be considered to no longer be personal, regardless of what the other party claims they wish to use it for.

You are right. When we shared it to register accounts on social media, they know our data and possibly use it as well.
But it is sometimes hard to avoid since everyone must have a social media account as it is a necessary thing for now.