Fertility tracking app Premom settles with the FTC and state AGs for $200K over allegedly sharing sensitive user information with third parties without consent
Washington PostTatum Hunter
Context & Ripple Effects
This settlement closes a loop opened in August 2020, when researchers alleged that Premom was sharing user data with three Chinese companies without consent — an episode serious enough that Google briefly pulled the app from its Play Store. The FTC and state attorneys general have now converted those allegations into a formal $200K resolution.
Premom pays $200K and inherits FTC/state oversight of how it collects and shares sensitive fertility data — the alleged third-party sharing that triggered the 2020 Play Store removal becomes contractually off-limits going forward.
Second-order effects
Rivals with compliance positioning gain a marketing wedge: Clue, which already secured FDA clearance for its digital contraceptive, can differentiate on regulated-data handling precisely as users reassess tracking apps post-Roe.
App analytics firms and brokers feeding on health-adjacent apps face the Kochava-plus-Premom pattern — two fronts of FTC pressure — raising the cost of monetizing reproductive data through third parties.
Third-order effects
If the FTC keeps pairing data-broker suits with app-level settlements, sensitive-category apps (fertility, pregnancy, health) will need consent architectures built for disclosure rather than bolted-on policies — making regulatory compliance a competitive feature in consumer health.
The trend: Consumer health apps are being pushed from informal data-sharing toward audited consent structures, as reproductive-health privacy turns into an active FTC enforcement category.
ICYMI: An FTC complaint confirmed findings I first reported in 2020 that the fertility app Premom was sharing user data with Chinese advertisers without user permission. The company has settled for $200,000 w/ the FTC and state AGs. https://cyberscoop.com/...
1. Today @FTC took action against Premom, an ovulation tracking app, for disclosing highly sensitive personal data to third parties and violating the Health Breach Notification Rule. https://www.ftc.gov/...
One more thing to note here: the FTC is expected tomorrow to introduce a notice of proposed rulemaking to update the Health Breach Notification Rule, which it says in its complaint that Premom violated. https://cyberscoop.com/... [image]
BREAKING: The FTC found that fertility app Premom was sharing data indicating pregnancy status with Google and other advertisers without user permission. I broke the news the app sharing sensitive data without user permission in 2020. https://cyberscoop.com/...
An innovative way to get around the basic problem, which is that HIPAA does not cover apps regardless of how much health information they collect. https://twitter.com/...
5. @FTC will continue to vigorously deploy all of our legal authorities, including the Health Breach Notification Rule, to protect users' health data from being exploited.
4. This action builds on our recent HBNR action against @GoodRx, a telehealth and prescription drug discount provider, for illegally sharing users' personal health information with Facebook, Google, and other companies for advertising purposes. https://www.ftc.gov/...
Notice how this US regulator adopts the language and doctrines of European data protection when an American company violates a US law. A lot of this is also in the draft federal ADPPA and some state laws. These aren't exclusively European ideas but there is some copy/pasting. [im…
The third FTC action against a health app sharing data with social media and analytics firms. Under this proposed order, the FTC would be keeping extremely close tabs on fertility app Premom. These FTC consent orders are pretty brutal. [image]