A class action lawsuit against Meta claims that Facebook and Instagram’s iOS apps circumvented App Tracking Transparency rules in order to illegally continue tracking users without permission. Since iOS 14, Apple’s App Tracking Transparency (ATT) has required apps to stop tracking users unless that user gives them explicit permission to continue. Facebook famously objected to the ATT and revealed that it had a more than $10 billion impact on its projected revenue.
However, a proposed new class action lawsuit claims that Meta, the owner of Facebook and Instagram, has been circumventing ATT and collecting data regardless of user preferences and choices, Bloomberg reports.
The lawsuit, filed in San Francisco federal court, is based on research by data privacy researcher and former Google engineer Felix Krauss. He claims that Facebook and Instagram inject JavaScript code into the websites that users visit.
Krauss said the JavaScript code allowed Meta to track “anything you do on any website. This goes further than regular ad tracking, and even theoretically includes the ability to capture passwords entered into websites.
The lawsuit further alleges that Facebook opens web links in its own in-app browser, rather than using Safari or any user’s default browser.
The suit says, “This allows Meta to intercept, monitor, and record its users’ interactions and communications with third parties, and it also uses the data it collects to boost advertising revenue, contrary to users’ preferences.”
Meta has not commented publicly on the lawsuit, and the company acknowledges that it monitors browser activity but denies the allegations of illegal data collection.
The two cases at the center of the class action filing are Willis v. Meta Platforms Inc., 22-cv-05376, and Mitchell v. Meta Platforms Inc., 22-cv-05267, both filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California (San Francisco).
