AMC To Pay $8 Million For Allegedly Sharing Subscribers' Viewing History With Tech Companies

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: On Thursday, AMC notified subscribers of a proposed $8.3 million settlement that provides awards to an estimated 6 million subscribers of its six streaming services: AMC+, Shudder, Acorn TV, ALLBLK, SundanceNow, and HIDIVE. The settlement comes in response to allegations that AMC illegally shared subscribers' viewing history with tech companies like Google, Facebook, and X (aka Twitter) in violation of the Video Privacy Protection Act (VPPA). Passed in 1988, the VPPA prohibits AMC and other video service providers from sharing "information which identifies a person as having requested or obtained specific video materials or services from a video tape service provider." It was originally passed to protect individuals' right to private viewing habits, after a journalist published the mostly unrevealing video rental history of a judge, Robert Bork, who had been nominated to the Supreme Court by Ronald Reagan.

The so-called "Bork Tapes" revealed little -- other than that the judge frequently rented spy thrillers and British costume dramas -- but lawmakers recognized that speech could be chilled by monitoring anyone's viewing habits. While the law was born in the era of Blockbuster Video, subscribers suing AMC wrote in their amended complaint (PDF) that "the importance of legislation like the VPPA in the modern era of datamining is more pronounced than ever before." According to subscribers suing, AMC allegedly installed tracking technologies -- including the Meta Pixel, the X Tracking Pixel, and Google Tracking Technology -- on its website, allowing their personally identifying information to be connected with their viewing history. [...]

If it's approved, AMC has agreed to "suspend, remove, or modify operation of the Meta Pixel and other Third-Party Tracking Technologies so that use of such technologies on AMC Services will not result in AMC's disclosure to the third-party technology companies of the specific video content requested or obtained by a specific individual." All registered users of AMC services who "requested or obtained video content on at least one of the six AMC services" between January 18, 2021, and January 10, 2024, are currently eligible to submit claims under the proposed settlement. The deadline to submit is April 9. In addition to distributing the $8.3 million settlement fund among class members, subscribers will also receive a free one-week digital subscription.

Cheap at the price

[nicolaiplum]

I bet AMC earned more than $1.38 per customer by selling their customers' viewing information, so this is merely a dent in their revenues and no significant penalty.

Re:

[ShanghaiBill]

I bet AMC earned more than $1.38 per customer by selling their customers' viewing information

Many years ago, I worked for a company that bought mailing lists based on magazine subscriptions for about a penny each.

Who would pay $1.38 per name? How would they monetize it?

You are way overestimating the value of your private information to other people.

Re:

[entranced]

The entire world runs on ads, and you think AMC couldn't generate $1.38 per customer's viewing habits (years of viewing habits at that)? They surely made an order of magnitude more.

Re:

[Ed Tice]

Nobody paid $1.38 per name. 138 vendors paid a penny per name. Based on your comment, I did a quick Google of Google's ad revenue. 2.3B last year in ad revenue. I couldn't get a breakdown by region. Assuming 50% is US (which is somewhat standard in this space), that's about $500/person that flows to Google to serve ads to each of us.

Re: Cheap at the price

[192_kbps]

You're way underestimating the value of privacy.

Re:

[Narcocide]

Ah, I see. So this is one of the talking points your Russian masters pay you to quash. The real question is whether you knew they actually meant "rubles" when they said "dollars."

Re:

[Can'tNot]

Yeah, I was going to say: The real question is, what happens to the data?

over and over

[WolfgangVL]

The consumer gets abused, gov agency gets paid, and the consumer is just expected to fk off down the road to the next abuse.

Using 3rd-Party Analytics

[nadass]

The issue is not about AMC packaging and selling its users' activity history willfully and with malintent. The issue is that AMC used third-party services to track first-party activity (including viewing history details).

If AMC had simply hosted their own web/streaming analytics solutions (like their own instance of Webtrends or similar) and kept all of the information in-house, then they would not have unwittingly violated these (and other) regulations. AMC should also conduct more due diligence than Mu

Meta Pixel et al.

[Seclusion]

I really don't like the name. I think it's quite misleading. It's not some kind of graphic file, it's JavaScript. It's the reason why I have at least one JavaScript blocking add-on in every browser I use. It's also why I use ad blockers while watching videos on services where I pay for an ad free experience.

Borked it

[sixsixtysix]

They really borked it this time

And what about the real perps?

[evanh]

Facebook, Google and the whole online ad industry are the real perpetrators here. They're the ones really pushing this shit.

Force them to rely on context only advertising. Tracking of individuals needs eliminated.

a free one-week digital subscription!

[Kevoco]

OMG OMG OMGOMGOMGOMG!

US surveillance capitalism is rampant and legal

[sinkskinkshrieks]

Once a person passing through America physically or virtually (except Europeans, sometimes) allows any company to have identifying personal details intentionally or surreptitiously, it's not "theirs" anymore regardless of bullshit legalese buried in the EULAs and contracts. It's almost a "self-regulated" honor system. In the US, information about people isn't theirs. It's owned by the company that has it, and it can largely do whatever deanonymizing and correlation linking between user accounts and shadowy

Re:

[classiclantern]

Everyone should place a value on their personal data so when it is stolen, an accurate loss is established. I would like to state publicly, here and now, my movie watching history is worth $299.95 per event. I would like to state publicly, here and now, my TV watching history is worth $199.95 per event. Assuming I did not give permission by clicking through the EULA, I expect to be paid in cash withing 90 days. I know Meta has a file on me even though I never agreed to give up my privacy. I'll assume a