AT&T, Sprint, #verizon, and T-Mobile will be fined more than $200 million for selling customer locations, per report
Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge
The Federal Communications Commission plans to fine four mobile phone carriers a total of $200 million for making consumers’ real-time location data available to third parties, Reuters reported Thursday. The companies will be able to challenge the amount of the fines, expected to be announced Friday, before they become final, Reuters reported.
The FCC did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the report.
Motherboard reported last year that AT&T, Sprint, Verizon, and T-Mobile were selling users’ real-time location data to third-party distributors. In the wake of that report, the carriers pledged to stop selling the data or, in some cases, said they had already cut ties with the offending contractors.
