{"id":794250,"date":"2026-07-30T23:00:19","date_gmt":"2026-07-30T23:00:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/794250\/"},"modified":"2026-07-30T23:00:19","modified_gmt":"2026-07-30T23:00:19","slug":"ftc-sues-hims-hers-for-allegedly-sharing-patients-medical-data-with-advertisers-meta-and-snap","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/794250\/","title":{"rendered":"FTC sues Hims & Hers for allegedly sharing patients’ medical data with advertisers Meta and Snap"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Federal Trade Commission is suing<\/a> healthcare giant Hims & Hers for allegedly sharing its customers\u2019 medical and healthcare information with advertisers and tech giants, like Meta and Snap, as well as for misleading consumers about its privacy practices.<\/p>\n

The lawsuit is the federal consumer watchdog\u2019s latest crackdown in recent years on healthcare companies that share sensitive information with outside companies without their customers\u2019 knowledge. Hims & Hers, now a publicly traded company<\/a>, provides prescription medication for sexual wellness, mental health conditions, weight loss, and other issues, and as such handles a large amount of sensitive patient data.<\/p>\n

Companies typically try to learn more about their customers by installing code on their websites in order to share users\u2019 information with advertisers, like Meta and Snap, which then use the data to provide information about who is visiting their websites and when.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In its complaint<\/a> filed in a California federal court, the FTC alleged that Hims & Hers placed pixel-sized trackers provided by Meta, Snap, and other tech and advertising giants, including Microsoft, Pinterest, Reddit, and X. These trackers, the FTC said, \u201ccaptured and shared users\u2019 health information,\u201d contrary to Hims & Hers\u2019 own privacy policy. The FTC alleges the company also used Meta\u2019s tools to track users\u2019 clicks and other actions that users took on its website.<\/p>\n

The FTC also accused Hims & Hers of deceptive billing, and drawing up policies that allegedly made it difficult for customers to cancel, in violation of federal consumer protection laws.<\/p>\n

Hims & Hers did not explicitly deny the FTC\u2019s claims in a statement on its website<\/a>. The company claimed its privacy policy \u201cmakes clear\u201d that users \u201cmay choose how their data is used,\u201d and said it is \u201cconfident\u201d in its position. Hims & Hers said it plans to defend against the FTC\u2019s allegations.<\/p>\n

The FTC has previously taken action against telehealth startup Cerebral, alcohol recovery provider Monument<\/a>, as well as data giant GoodRx<\/a> and therapy provider BetterHelp<\/a>. These companies were similarly accused of sharing patients\u2019 sensitive data through their websites to third-party tech giants and advertisers.<\/p>\n

The use of pixel-sized trackers has previously revealed how people\u2019s sensitive data gets shared with the companies who provide the code, highlighting how misconfigurations can result in unwanted data collection. <\/p>\n

In 2024, TechCrunch found that the U.S. Postal Service was sharing logged-in users\u2019 home addresses<\/a> with Meta, LinkedIn, and Snap by using their pixel tracking code. The USPS removed the code soon after.<\/p>\n

When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission<\/a>. This doesn\u2019t affect our editorial independence.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Federal Trade Commission is suing healthcare giant Hims & Hers for allegedly sharing its customers\u2019 medical and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":794251,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[59],"tags":[7257,19871,97,252,253,214584],"class_list":["post-794250","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health-care","tag-cybersecurity","tag-federal-trade-commission","tag-health","tag-health-care","tag-healthcare","tag-hims-hers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/794250","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=794250"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/794250\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/794251"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=794250"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=794250"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=794250"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}