T-Mobile Will Sell Your Web Usage Data to Advertisers Unless You Opt Out
upstart writes in with an IRC submission:
T-Mobile will sell your web usage data to advertisers unless you opt out:
"[S]tarting April 26, 2021, TMobile will begin a new program that uses some data we have about you, including information we learn from your web and device usage data (like the apps installed on your device) and interactions with our products and services for our own and 3rd party advertising, unless you tell us not to," T-Mobile said in a privacy notice. "When we share this information with third parties, it is not tied to your name or information that directly identifies you."
For directions on how to opt out of the expanded data sharing, see the first section of the T-Mobile privacy notice.
T-Mobile, which completed its purchase of Sprint in April 2020, said that the new advertising "program changes the way Sprint offered choices for sharing in the past, as this data was previously used only if you indicated that it was OK with you first."
[...] T-Mobile says in another webpage describing its advertising and analytics program that it collects "addresses of websites visited; types of websites visited, like sports sites, music sites, etc.; applications, content, and features used-including how much time you spent using them, and information from servers that host these apps, content, and features."
[...] In order to anonymize data before it's sold to third parties, T-Mobile said that it ties the information "to your mobile advertising identifier or another unique identifier" instead of the customer's name. But you'll have to take T-Mobile's word on just how anonymous the anonymized data actually is. "[P]rivacy groups say those IDs can be linked back to people by comparing different data sets," The Wall Street Journal noted in an article on the T-Mobile changes today.
[...] The Obama-era FCC tried to require home Internet and mobile broadband providers to get consumers' opt-in consent before using, sharing, or selling Web browsing and app usage histories, but a Republican-controlled Congress and then-President Trump killed the rule in 2017 before it took effect.
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