[Federal Register Volume 84, Number 161 (Tuesday, August 20, 2019)]
[Notices]
[Pages 43132-43134]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2019-17815]
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FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION
[File No. 172 3139]
Unrollme Inc.; Analysis To Aid Public Comment
AGENCY: Federal Trade Commission.
ACTION: Proposed consent agreement; request for comment.
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SUMMARY: The consent agreement in this matter settles alleged
violations of federal law prohibiting unfair or deceptive acts or
practices. The attached Analysis to Aid Public Comment describes both
the allegations in the complaint and the terms of the consent order--
embodied in the consent agreement--that would settle these allegations.
DATES: Comments must be received on or before September 19, 2019.
ADDRESSES: Interested parties may file comments online or on paper, by
following the instructions in the Request for Comment part of the
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section below. Write: ``Unrollme Inc.; File
No. 172 3139'' on your comment, and file your comment online at https://www.regulations.gov by following the instructions on the web-based
form. If you prefer to file your comment on paper, mail your comment to
the following address: Federal Trade Commission, Office of the
Secretary, 600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Suite CC-5610 (Annex D),
Washington, DC 20580, or deliver your comment to the following address:
Federal Trade Commission, Office of the Secretary, Constitution Center,
400 7th Street SW, 5th Floor, Suite 5610 (Annex D), Washington, DC
20024.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Amanda Koulousias (202-326-3334),
Bureau of Consumer Protection, Federal Trade Commission, 600
Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington, DC 20580.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Pursuant to Section 6(f) of the Federal
Trade Commission Act, 15 U.S.C. 46(f), and FTC Rule 2.34, 16 CFR 2.34,
notice is hereby given that the above-captioned consent agreement
containing a consent order to cease and desist, having been filed with
and accepted, subject to final approval, by the Commission, has been
placed on the public record for a period of thirty (30) days. The
following Analysis to Aid Public Comment describes the terms of the
consent agreement and the allegations in the complaint. An electronic
copy of the full text of the consent agreement package can be obtained
from the FTC Home Page (for August 8, 2019), on the World Wide Web, at
https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/commission-actions.
You can file a comment online or on paper. For the Commission to
consider your comment, we must receive it on or before September 19,
2019. Write ``Unrollme Inc.; File No. 172 3139'' on your comment. Your
comment--including your name and your state--will be placed on the
public record of this proceeding, including, to the extent practicable,
on the https://www.regulations.gov website.
Postal mail addressed to the Commission is subject to delay due to
heightened security screening. As a result, we encourage you to submit
your comments online through the https://www.regulations.gov website.
If you prefer to file your comment on paper, write ``Unrollme Inc.;
File No. 172 3139'' on your comment and on the envelope, and mail your
comment to the following address: Federal Trade Commission, Office of
the Secretary, 600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Suite CC-5610 (Annex D),
Washington, DC 20580; or deliver your comment to the following address:
Federal Trade Commission, Office of the Secretary, Constitution Center,
400 7th Street SW, 5th Floor, Suite 5610 (Annex D), Washington, DC
20024. If possible, submit your paper comment to the Commission by
courier or overnight service.
Because your comment will be placed on the publicly accessible
website at https://www.regulations.gov, you are solely responsible for
making sure that your comment does not include any sensitive or
confidential information. In particular, your comment should not
include any sensitive personal information, such as your or anyone
else's Social Security number; date of birth; driver's license number
or other state identification number, or foreign country equivalent;
passport number; financial account number; or credit or debit card
number. You are also solely responsible for making sure that your
comment does not include any sensitive health information, such as
medical records or other individually identifiable health information.
In addition, your comment should not include any ``trade secret or any
commercial or financial information which . . . is privileged or
confidential''--as provided by Section 6(f) of the FTC Act, 15 U.S.C.
46(f), and FTC Rule 4.10(a)(2), 16 CFR 4.10(a)(2)--including in
particular competitively sensitive information such as costs, sales
statistics, inventories, formulas, patterns, devices, manufacturing
processes, or customer names.
Comments containing material for which confidential treatment is
requested must be filed in paper form, must be clearly labeled
``Confidential,'' and must comply with FTC Rule 4.9(c). In particular,
the written request for confidential treatment that accompanies the
comment must include the factual and legal basis for the request, and
must identify the specific portions of the comment to be withheld from
the public record. See FTC Rule 4.9(c). Your comment will be kept
confidential only if the General Counsel grants your request in
accordance with the law and the public interest. Once your comment has
been posted on the public FTC website--as legally required by FTC
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Rule 4.9(b)--we cannot redact or remove your comment from the FTC
website, unless you submit a confidentiality request that meets the
requirements for such treatment under FTC Rule 4.9(c), and the General
Counsel grants that request.
Visit the FTC website at http://www.ftc.gov to read this Notice and
the news release describing it. The FTC Act and other laws that the
Commission administers permit the collection of public comments to
consider and use in this proceeding, as appropriate. The Commission
will consider all timely and responsive public comments that it
receives on or before September 19, 2019. For information on the
Commission's privacy policy, including routine uses permitted by the
Privacy Act, see https://www.ftc.gov/site-information/privacy-policy.
Analysis of Proposed Consent Order To Aid Public Comment
The Federal Trade Commission (``Commission'') has accepted, subject
to final approval, an agreement containing a consent order from
Unrollme Inc. (``Unrollme'').
The proposed consent order has been placed on the public record for
thirty (30) days for receipt of comments by interested persons.
Comments received during this period will become part of the public
record. After 30 days, the Commission will again review the agreement
and the comments received, and will decide whether it should withdraw
from the agreement and take appropriate action or make final the
agreement's proposed order.
This matter involves Unrollme's email management service, which
Unrollme has offered to consumers since at least June 2012. Unrollme
provides services to consumers to help them manage subscription emails,
such as newsletters or marketing emails from retailers. During the
sign-up process, Unrollme requires consumers to grant Unrollme full
access to the email accounts that they wish to enroll in its services.
This permission allows Unrollme to access and scan users' inboxes for
subscription emails to provide its services. Unrollme also provides
access to its users' email accounts to its parent company, Slice
Technologies, Inc. (``Slice''). Slice, a market research company,
accesses Unrollme users' inboxes in order to collect information from
the users' e-receipts, i.e., emailed receipts from businesses following
an order or purchase. Slice retains this information, and creates a
separate database of anonymous purchase information that it uses in its
market research analytics products.
After learning that Unrollme requires access to their email
account(s) during the sign-up process, some consumers declined to grant
that permission. The proposed complaint alleges that when consumers
initially declined to grant permission to their email account(s),
Unrollme violated Section 5 of the FTC Act by making false and
deceptive statements designed to encourage the consumer to change his
or her mind and grant Unrollme access to his or her email account(s)
and continue the sign-up process.
Count I of the proposed complaint alleges that Unrollme
represented, directly or indirectly, expressly or by implication, that
it would not touch users' ``personal emails.'' From at least January
2015 through November 2015, Unrollme's message to consumers who
declined to grant Unrollme access to their email stated, ``It looks
like you clicked No thanks. In order to use Unroll.me, you need to tell
[your email service provider] to allow us to monitor your emails. Don't
worry, we won't touch your personal stuff.'' (Emphasis added). From
November 2015 through October 26, 2016, Unrollme's message to consumers
who declined to grant Unrollme access to their email stated,
``Authorization Declined In order to use Unroll.me, you need to
authorize us to access your emails. Don't worry, this is just to watch
for those pesky newsletters, we'll never touch your personal stuff.''
(Emphasis added). The proposed complaint alleges that these
representations were false or misleading because Unrollme grants Slice
access to its users' inboxes, including personal emails in the form of
e-receipts, which is then used to collect and sell purchase information
contained therein to third parties.
Count II of the proposed complaint alleges that Unrollme
represented, directly or indirectly, expressly or by implication, that
Unrollme required access to users' inboxes in order to scan for
subscription emails. From October 27, 2016, through at least September
2018, Unrollme's message to consumers who declined to grant Unrollme
access to their email has stated, ``Oops! Looks like you declined
access'' and ``Unroll.Me requires access to your inbox so we can scan
for subscriptions and allow you to begin clearing out your inbox.'' The
complaint alleges that Unrollme failed to disclose, or failed to
disclose adequately, that Unrollme also grants Slice access to its
users' inboxes, which Slice then used to collect and sell purchase
information contained in users' personal emails in the form of e-
receipts and that this fact would be material to consumers in their
decision to use Unrollme's services.
The proposed order contains injunctive provisions addressing the
alleged deceptive conduct. Part I of the proposed order prohibits
misrepresentations about the extent to which Unrollme accesses,
collects, uses, stores or shares covered information in connection with
any product, service or software operated, owned or distributed by
Unrollme that requires access to consumer emails.
Part II of the proposed order requires Unrollme to send an email
notification to all known current users who enrolled in Unrollme's
services after viewing the challenged statements that explains that
Unrollme or its parent access or collect email purchase receipts for
use in market research products that are sold to third parties. The
required notification is contained in Exhibit A of the proposed order.
Part III of the proposed order requires Unrollme to delete within 10
days of the entry of the Order all stored email purchase receipts, and
all personally identifiable information obtained from those receipts,
for all known users who enrolled in Unrollme's services after viewing
the challenged statements.
Parts IV through VII of the proposed order are reporting and
compliance provisions, which include recordkeeping requirements and
provisions requiring Unrollme to provide information or documents
necessary for the Commission to monitor compliance.
Part VIII states that the proposed order will remain in effect for
20 years, with certain exceptions.
The purpose of this analysis is to aid public comment on the
proposed order. It is not intended to constitute an official
interpretation of the complaint or proposed order, or to modify in any
way the proposed order's terms.
By direction of the Commission.
April J. Tabor,
Acting Secretary.
Separate Statement of Commissioner Noah Joshua Phillips
I join my colleagues in supporting this settlement, but write
separately to highlight the surrounding circumstances, which are
relevant to the current privacy debate.
As the complaint alleges, Unroll.me offered a free service that
helped consumers organize their email inboxes. It supported this free
service by allowing its parent company to scan consumers' emails for
purchase-related information, which the parent collected for the
anonymized market research it
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sells. Until around September 2018, the complaint alleges that, in a
number of instances, Unroll.me failed adequately to disclose these
collection practices, which failure violated the law.
Unrelated to the allegations in the complaint, in late 2018, Google
announced it would limit third-party apps (like Unroll.me) from using
the information in Gmail accounts of consumers for purposes such as
market research or advertising.\1\ Promoted as means to enhance
consumer privacy, that decision may also limit consumer choice and
competition.
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\1\ Ben Smith, Project Strobe: Protecting your data, improving
our third-party APIs, and sunsetting consumer Google+, Google Safety
and Security (Oct. 8, 2018), https://www.blog.google/technology/safety-security/project-strobe/.
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Many millions of consumers see value in Unroll.me's service, which
helps them manage the barrage of daily emails crowding their inboxes.
Unroll.me has since removed the allegedly deceptive statements and
updated its disclosures--consumers may now be better aware of the
privacy trade-offs, and continue to use the service. For these
consumers, granting access for the collection of purchase data may be a
choice worth making. Google's new privacy restrictions threaten to take
that option away from consumers. That may be good for privacy, but not
for consumer choice.
While Google will retain control of and access to the valuable
purchase and other information about consumers contained in their Gmail
accounts, other market actors--like Unroll.me and its parent, Rakuten
Intelligence, a market research firm--may no longer have access.
Google's restrictions thus potentially ``imperil the business models of
some popular email extensions,'' \2\ like Unroll.me. That may be good
for privacy, but not for competition.
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\2\ Cat Zakrzewski, A small privacy change for Google leads to
big disruptions for start-ups, Washington Post (Oct. 15, 2018),
https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2018/10/15/small-privacy-change-google-leads-big-disruptions-startups/.
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I am not suggesting that Google sought to limit consumer choice or
competition, or that it is violating the law. Consumers are focusing
increasingly on privacy, and firms like Google may be responding to
that demand. But this situation highlights an important aspect of the
privacy debate, i.e., the impact that privacy-enhancing decisions may
have on consumer choice and competition.
There is no right answer, and we as a society may very well choose
limitations on consumer choice and competition to protect privacy.
Privacy is important. Consumers and policymakers alike must recognize,
however, that it comes with tradeoffs. And competition enforcers must
be vigilant, recognizing the potential of privacy efforts negatively to
impact competition.
[FR Doc. 2019-17815 Filed 8-19-19; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 6750-01-P