RE: Thousands of companies share your data with Facebook

[Consumer Reports]   Friend, Nearly 30,000 consumers have already joined Consumer Reports in demanding strong rules that limit companies access to our most personal information. [Sign our petition]( Friend, so we have strong, clear rules that limit what companies are allowed to do with our most sensitive, personal data. Our recent investigation found that the average person in our study had their data shared to Facebook by 2,230 different companies. This kind of data sharing is rampant, and we believe companies should not have unlimited access to your personal information!  [Sign the Petition »](  [Join CR in calling on the Federal Trade Commission]( to implement strong rules that limit what information giant tech platforms like Facebook, Google and others can collect and share about you. Thanks, Angel Han Consumer Reports --------------------------------------------------------------- Friend It’s downright creepy – you’ve been talking about needing new sneakers, and soon ads for them appear in your Facebook or Instagram feed. But your phone isn’t actually listening to you, it’s that thousands of companies are feeding information about your life to companies like Facebook in order to target you. New research by Consumer Reports has found that the average person in our study had their data shared to Facebook by 2,230 different companies. Information shared can include everything from number of gym visits, miles run on fitness-tracking apps, and online searches for athletic-wear (hence the sneaker ads); to very personal information, including your income and ages of your children, if you used certain online tax prep services. Companies should not have this type of unlimited access to your personal information! Join CR in calling for strong rules that limit what information companies like Facebook collect and share about you. [The Federal Trade Commission has the power to do this – we just need fed-up consumers to push them to act!](  [Sign the Petition »](  Our new findings came about because CR members donated their Facebook ad data to us. After we combed through that information, we discovered a staggering 186,000 companies collected and shared data on our 709 study participants with Facebook. This includes recognizable names like Home Depot, Macy’s, Amazon and Walmart, as well as political groups, marketing agencies, and data brokers. Not only were they tracking consumers’ online activity, but what they did offline as well: places visited, events attended, products ordered, and so on. Once this information is sent to Facebook or other platforms, it can be matched to users, who are then served advertisements (even non-Facebook users may have their data collected and sent). While some people may like the personalization of these targeted ads, there can be a downside to this profiling: this sensitive information is now accessible – and at risk of a data breach – by thousands of different companies, some of whom may use it to charge more for goods or services depending on income, or to trick people into buying similar fake products to those recently purchased. Facebook isn’t the only platform that collects our data this way – Google, Netflix and TikTok are just some of the many companies that create these types of advertising profiles. Consumer Reports is pushing hard for strong state and national privacy laws to stop companies from collecting or sharing data outside of what is necessary to provide the service requested by the consumer. But Big Tech companies and data brokers are fighting these reforms because your data is so lucrative – Facebook, for example, made nearly $114 billion in advertising revenue in 2022. It’s going to take all of us speaking out against these invasive tactics to get action. [Tell the FTC to set strong data privacy rules now!]( [Sign the Petition »]( Thank you again for working with us to make sure your privacy is protected, and companies that exploit it are held accountable. We’re up against deep pockets, so please share this petition with everyone you know and urge them to join us in this fight. Angel Han Consumer Reports [Unsubscribe from Consumer Reports action alerts.]( © 2022 Consumer Reports, 101 Truman Avenue, Yonkers, NY, 10703 [Contact Consumer Reports](