Pay penalty due to television collecting user's detailed content viewing data secretly Fear of developing into class actions

The Federal Trade Commission of America (FTC)VIZIOAnnounced that VIZIO will respond to the payment of 2.2 million dollars (about 250 million yen) on the assumption that users have collected viewing data of programs and contents without user's permission. This is an agreement with the FTC to the last, the possibility of a class action is left.

VIZIO to Pay $ 2.2 Million to FTC, State of New Jersey to Settle Charges It Collected Viewing Histories on 11 Million Smart Televisions without Users' Consent | Federal Trade Commission
https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/press-releases/2017/02/vizio-pay-22-million-ftc-state-new-jersey-settle-charges-it

What Vizio was doing behind the TV screen | Federal Trade Commission
https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/blogs/business-blog/2017/02/what-vizio-was-doing-behind-tv-screen

FTC that received complaints from consumers complained of "VIZIO's unauthorized collection of data to users", VIZIO told FTC and the New Jersey state consumer agency a total of $ 2.2 million (about 250 million yen) It was announced that they agreed to pay.

According to the FTC, VIZIO has secretly collected user information, hiding the "Smart Interactivity" function installed in VIZIO television from around 2014. It is in 2015 that VIZIO's TV is acquiring information without permission from the userArs TechnicaIt was pointed out by.

According to FTC, VIZIO analyzes the pixel information of the rendered image every 2 seconds to accurately see the content, using YouTube's equivalent technology used in copyright information analysis, broadcast waves Not only CATV, streaming movies and other content that users watch, we have collected 1 billion data points every day from 11 million VIZIO televisions. Content information and the user's IP address are strapped together and are said to be sold to external companies as 'data reflecting consumer preferences'.


Although it is a TV made by VIZIO who swept the American market, such as pushing out TV makers such as Pioneer by overwhelming low price, it seems that low price was realized by selling user's personal information.

The breakdown agreed by VIZIO is $ 1.5 million (about 170 million yen) to the FTC, 1 million dollars (about 110 million yen) to the New Jersey state consumer agency, of which $ 300,000 (about 3400 It is said that payment will be reserved for 10,000 yen). However, this is only an agreement between VIZIO who was a party to this action and FTC and others, raising a civil lawsuit by the user is another matter. In the future, there is a possibility that it will develop into a class action litigation by a large number of users of VIZIO Television who acquired a large share in the American TV market with low pricesPointing outIt is being done.