Penalty Amount
$5,800,000
Consumers Affected
55,000
The FTC charged Ring LLC with allowing employees to access private customer videos without consent and failing to secure user accounts, leading to hackers controlling cameras. Under a proposed consent order, Ring must pay $5.8 million in refunds, delete unlawfully accessed data, and implement a privacy and security program.
Ring must pay $5.8 million for consumer refunds, delete all customer videos and derived data from before 2018, implement a privacy and security program with safeguards on human video review and multi-factor authentication, report unauthorized access incidents to the FTC, notify consumers about the action, and is prohibited from profiting from unlawfully accessed videos.
In-house legal teams should review all vendor, customer, and data processing agreements involving Ring or similar IoT/security camera providers. Focus on clauses governing data access rights (especially employee/contractor access), security obligations (encryption, authentication), audit rights, data retention/deletion, and breach notification. Required changes may include: adding mandatory multi-factor authentication for all account access, restricting human video review to legitimate business purposes with audit logs, requiring prompt deletion of unlawfully accessed data, implementing data minimization principles, and ensuring refund mechanisms for harmed consumers. Employee agreements should also be updated to reflect new privacy safeguards.
Entity
Ring LLC
Also known as: Ring
Industry
TechnologyOfficial Press Release
https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2023/05/ftc-says-ring-employees-illegally-surveilled-customers-failed-stop-hackers-taking-control-users
proposed stipulated order ring
https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/ftc_gov/pdf/proposed_stipulated_order_ring.pdf
complaint ring
https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/ftc_gov/pdf/complaint_ring.pdf
Federal Trade Commission Enforcement Page
https://www.ftc.gov/enforcement
"Ring LLC"
"$5.8 million"
"allowing any employee or contractor to access consumers’ private videos and by failing to implement basic privacy and security protections, enabling hackers to take control of consumers’ accounts, cameras, and videos."
$12.0M
The FTC alleged that payment processor Humboldt Merchant Services knowingly processed payments for more than 1,000 shell merchant entities serving as fronts for fraudulent companies engaged in unauthorized billing scams, despite red flags including chargeback rates nearly 10 times higher than card-brand thresholds. Under the proposed stipulated order filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan, Humboldt will pay $12 million for consumer redress and is permanently banned from processing payments for merchants with a heightened risk of potential fraud.
$4.8M
The FTC charged Canada-based payment processor Nuvei Corporation and its subsidiaries with knowingly processing payments for fraudulent merchants, including more than $30 million in payments for the Reimage tech support scam from 2017 to 2023, as well as merchants making false earnings claims and impersonating government tax authorities. Under the stipulated order filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona, Nuvei will pay $4.85 million for consumer redress, is banned from serving tech support telemarketers, and must implement robust merchant screening and chargeback monitoring practices. Note: this is a payments-fraud facilitation action under the FTC Act and Telemarketing Sales Rule, not a data privacy violation.
The FTC announced a seven-day extension of the public comment period on its proposed enforcement policy statement regarding personalized pricing, pushing the deadline from Sept. 18, 2026 to Sept. 25, 2026. Personalized pricing refers to using personal data to set prices based on what the company believes an individual consumer is willing to spend. This is a procedural announcement about draft agency guidance, not an enforcement action against any company, and no entity was named, no violation found, and no penalty imposed.
Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser joined the FTC and 22 state attorneys general in filing a lawsuit against Amazon for manipulating the auctions used to set advertising prices, replacing actual auction results with higher prices since 2019 and overcharging nearly 1.2 million U.S. advertising customers. The FTC estimates total improper surcharges from 2018 to 2026 exceed $20 billion, with costs ultimately passed to shoppers through higher prices. The states seek a permanent injunction and monetary relief; no penalty has been imposed yet as this is a newly filed complaint.
$930K
The FTC finalized orders requiring CMG Media Corporation (doing business as Cox Media Group), MindSift LLC, and 1010 Digital Works LLC to pay a total of $930,000 for falsely claiming they offered an AI-powered service that could target ads based on conversations captured from consumers' smart devices, and that consumers had opted into such targeting. The orders also prohibit the companies from making misrepresentations about their advertising services, voice data collection, and consumer consent.
The FTC announced it is seeking public comment on a proposed enforcement policy statement regarding personalized pricing, which is the use of personal data to set prices based on what a company believes an individual consumer is willing to spend. The statement warns that undisclosed collection or use of personal data for personalized pricing could violate the FTC Act's prohibition on unfair or deceptive practices. The Commission voted 2-0 to authorize the Federal Register notice.