Fertility app Premom to pay $200,000 following alleged privacy violations

Premom – a fertility tracking app – is coughing up $200,000 following alleged data privacy violations. Easy Healthcare, the owner of Premom, has collected the data of “hundreds of thousands” of customers, per an Federal Trade Commission (FTC) complaint, and misled its users about what it does with their data.

According to the FTC, since 2018 Premom has shared users’ health information with Google and AppsFlyer, a marketing firm, as well as Jiguang and Umeng, two foreign mobile analytics companies. The company also violated the Health Breach Notification Rule, which requires vendors of personal health records to notify consumers and the FTC of any security breach.

The agency also alleges Premom’s misleading privacy policy disregarded Section 5 of the FTC Act, which “prohibits unfair or deceptive acts or practices in or affecting commerce.”

Easy Healthcare will pay $100,000 for violating the Health Breach Notification Rule, as well as $100,000 between Connecticut, the District of Columbia, and Oregon for violating their laws. 

The FTC’s crackdown on Premom is consistent with the Commission’s other recent activity, including the restrictions and fines on GoodRx in January. It is essential that the FTC and companies alike prioritize protecting consumer data.