Europe coughs up €400 to punter after breaking its own GDPR data protection rules

Gravy Analytics, a vendor of location intelligence info for marketers which reached a settlement with US authorities last year over its alleged unlawful sale of location, has reportedly been hacked – potentially exposing millions of smartphone users. A trove of Gravy Analytics data reviewed and verified by 404 Media apparently …

[Anonymous Coward]

"advertisers are leveraging "

Pretentious twat. Try "advertisers are ustng "

[Androgynous Cupboard]

Always satisfying to see the angry man criticising other people's spelling and grammar on the internet mis-spell "using".

[Dinanziame]

Must have been hit by the Mispeling vyrus. Bring a carrot with you!

[Anonymous Coward]

AC here. Don't conflate my inability to type with spelling mistakes

[Andrew Scott]

Sure, maybe the I and T keys are next to each other on your keyboard like the M and N are on mine, that would make that typo forgivable.

[may_i]

While I agree with the sentiment, ACs don't get a thumbs up.

[Missing Semicolon]

Not identifying the service provider.

Odd that Stiizy hasn't been hacked, their payment provider has. Yet they decline to identify them. Almost as if it's part of the T's and C's of the contract "if we screw up, it's on you, don't mention our name". Nice.

[Like a badger]

Just the ONE German citizen?

Even allowing that this was quite a niche instance, I'm guessing there's still a few hundred to a few thousand EU citizens who would be in a position to make the same claim and bank €400. Wonder how many will take notice and ask for their money?

[FrogsAndChips]

Re: Just the ONE German citizen?

Maybe he was the only one bold enough to login with his FB credentials, THEN complain that his data was being leaked to the US? I mean, shame on the European Commission for even allowing this login method, but if the guy was savvy enough to know what would happen to his info, he could have abstained instead pf going ahead then sung for damages (which were rightfully denied by the court).

[Blazde]

Re: Just the ONE German citizen?

Perhaps he was savvy enough to recognise that unless those savvy enough to know what will happen to their info intentionally trigger this kind of unlawful scenario and then go to court, the GDPR laws will never be widely adhered to or enforced.

[tiggity]

Re: Just the ONE German citizen?

I'm confused.

If the user had a FB account surely they had already chosen to sign all their privacy away to the USA servers of Zuck & co? Thus they had decided they were OK with that?

Not a FB user, but really, really doubt an EU resident FB data is siloed to EU servers only.

[DJO]

Don't assume crooks don't have patience

12 months of free credit monitoring services.

As if no crook would think of sitting on the data for a year.

[harrys]

Oh WOW

They called themselves gravy analytics!

Thats really really really are taking the p**s

Think about it... if your still going about willing to accept your data being abused this way for the sake of convenience

Even better, there are planty of ways for the techically englightened to use and abuse the big tech services without paying a penny

been doing it for years, seen it as my moral duty

[imanidiot]

With stories like that first one it should become ever more obvious to anyone that blocking ads as much as possible should be the default. Get an ad-blocker, script blocker and canvas blocker or run a browser with those integrated.

[IGotOut]

Much of it isn't done via browsers, but in app adverts.

I pointed this on here a while back.

I use Podcast Addict, an open source player, to download and play podcasts, oddly enough

The only permissions it has are storage and internet connectivity. Location data is explicitly denied.

So how do the adverts know where I'm based in order to play adverts for my local NHS?

Simple, IP based adverts. The app doesn't need location data, but the advertising scum just base it on your IP address when pushing out the advert.