Verizon Fined for ‘Supercookie’ Privacy Violation ⇥ reuters.com

David Shepardson, Reuters:

Verizon Communications Inc will pay a $1.35 million fine and agreed to a three-year consent decree after the Federal Communications Commission said on Monday it found the company’s wireless unit violated the privacy of its users.

Verizon Wireless agreed to get consumer consent before sending data about “supercookies” from its more than 100 million users, under a settlement. The largest U.S. mobile company inserted unique tracking codes in its users traffic for advertising purposes.

Supercookies are unique, undeletable identifiers inserted into web traffic to identify customers in order to deliver targeted ads from Verizon and others.

Based on their last quarter results, it will take Verizon approximately half an hour to recoup enough profits to cover this fine. That’ll learn ’em.