Religious affiliation, sexual orientation… Did Amazon (discreetly) track its customers ?

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While the giant Amazon is obviously accessible through a good old computer, the platform is also used every day by a great many customers via its mobile application. In two clicks, on a smartphone, it is thus possible to (re)order your favorite products. And it is precisely through these same smartphones that the American giant is today accused of having deliberately tracked some of its customers.

Did Amazon illicitly track its customers through their smartphones ?

According to a proposed class action filed in the federal court of San Francisco, Amazon would have in fact obtained “backdoor access” to consumers' smartphones by providing tens of thousands of app developers with code known as the Amazon Ads SDK to integrate into their apps.

In this way, the Amazon group was allegedly able to collect a huge amount of data about its customers, particularly regarding time-stamped geolocation data on the places where consumers live, work, purchase and visit. The data in question was thus able to reveal information that is at the very least sensitive, such as religious affiliation, sexual orientation or even health problems.

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« Amazon has taken consumers' digital markers and correlated a vast amount of personal information about them, entirely to the ;without the knowledge or consent of consumers ,” the complaint states.

It was filed by Felix Kolotinsky , California, which claims that Amazon collected its personal information through the app “Speedtest by Ookla » (which allows you to carry out tests to measure the quality of an Internet connection), installed on your phone.

© Bilanol/Shutterstock

For him, Amazon's behavior unquestionably violated California criminal law and a state law against unauthorized access to computers, and thus demands unspecified damages for millions of Californians.

At this time, the Amazon group has not deigned to make the slightest comment on this subject. It remains to be seen whether this new class action filed against the American giant will be concluded, and whether Amazon has indeed tracked some of its customers, which could cost it (very) dearly… So watch this space. Recently, Amazon was taken to court for another scandalous practice, since according to some, the company does not deliver as quickly to some customers living in poorer regions.

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