State Fines Mercury Insurance $27.5 Million For Unapproved Fees
by Marc Lifsher, Los Angeles Times
State regulators have issued a record $27.5-million fine against Mercury Insurance Group for charging customers fees that had not been approved by the Department of Insurance. The order closes a long-running case that involved charges made in 180,000 automobile insurance transactions between 1999 and 2004. … “Mercury auto insurance consumers paid $27.5 million in unapproved fees,” said Commissioner Dave Jones. “While the $27.5 million fine against Mercury is significant, it is commensurate with the amount of money that was unlawfully collected from Mercury policyholders.” Read More ›
New Rules To Limit Tactics On Hospitals’ Fee Collections
by Robert Pear, The New York Times
“With these rules, it should be easier for low- and moderate-income people to get care without having to worry about a hospital or a bill collector hounding them for money they don’t have,” said Jessica L. Curtis, a lawyer at Community Catalyst, a national consumer group based in Boston. … The rules generally require nonprofit hospitals to give consumers at least 120 days before taking “extraordinary collection actions,” which include reporting debts to credit bureaus and using debt collection agencies. Read More ›
Who Should Inspect Lyft, Uber Cars?
by Carolyn Said, San Francisco Chronicle
Vehicle inspections have long been a bone of contention for critics of the ride-hailing services, who contend that regulations are too lax. … Several driver-mentors who do inspections for Lyft said that they received only minimal training, consisting of text and videos on their phones, and that the inspections were largely cosmetic. … Inspections for taxis are more extensive, underscoring the industry’s assertion that it doesn’t operate on a level playing ground. Read More ›
Scathing Audit On Border Agency Drones Comes As Police Interest Rises
by Ali Winston, Center for Investigative Reporting
The critical report comes at a time when domestic law enforcement agencies are deepening their interest in unmanned aerial vehicles. Police departments around the country, including in Los Angeles, have purchased drones, though the Federal Aviation Administration has not yet granted them clearance to fly the vehicles. Customs and Border Protection’s Predator drones already have been used for domestic policing operations by federal agencies, including the FBI. Read More ›
CES: Security Risks From The Smart Home
by Molly Wood, The New York Times
LAS VEGAS — The Internet of Things arrived in force at this year’s International CES, the huge trade show here. But while manufacturers at the event painted a rosy picture of connected grills, coffee makers, refrigerators and door locks, security experts and regulators warned that the Internet of Things could be a threat to both security and privacy. … Perhaps because connected devices are relatively new, there are few security features built into many of them or the apps and services that power them. Even fewer products exist to lock down your smart home. Read More ›
New ‘Super Cookies’ Can Track Your Private Web Browsing — And Apple Users Can’t Get Rid Of Them
by Rob Price, provided by Business Insider, San Francisco Chronicle
[Security researcher Sam] Greenhalgh says that Apple’s Safari web browser is especially vulnerable to the exploit. While clearing cookies on Mozilla’s Firefox, Google Chrome or Opera also erases HSTS flags, deleting the super cookies, there’s no way to do so on Safari on iOS devices. This means that if you’ve had super cookies placed on your iPad or iPhone, there’s effectively no way to get rid of them short of reformatting the entire machine. Read More ›
New Law Cracks Down On Spyware
by Michael Finney, KGO-TV San Francisco
A new law in California that took effect January 1 limits the ability of rent-to-own companies to install spyware that could monitor a customer’s every move. …”It’s outrageous, you know when you are renting a computer you’re not giving permission to the rental company to capture all the information including your emails, and even pictures of you,” said Richard Holober, Executive Director of the Consumer Federation of California. The Consumer Federation of California successfully sponsored state legislation banning the practice without first notifying the consumer. Read More ›
Key Issues For Returning California Legislature
by Jeremy B. White and Laurel Rosenhall, The Sacramento Bee
Expect debates about consumer data, Internet privacy and regulation of some Web-based businesses to loom large this session. The tech lobby beefed up its presence in Sacramento last year, with the Internet Association opening an office here – its first office outside Washington, D.C. The group was instrumental in rallying ride-sharing services like Uber and Lyft to oppose legislation increasing their insurance requirements. A similar effort to regulate home-sharing services is likely to emerge in the Legislature this year. … The Assembly has established a new committee devoted to privacy and consumer protection, chaired by Assemblyman Mike Gatto. Read More ›
FCC Launches New, User-Friendly Help And Complaints Site For Consumers
by Kate Cox, Consumerist
Delara Derakhashani, policy counsel for Consumers Union, said, “This site will make it easier for people to file and track complaints about problems like annoying robocalls and fraudulent charges, and it will help the FCC spot emerging trends in the marketplace. This is a one-stop shop for consumers, and it’s a real improvement over the old system where forms and information were spread out and hard to find.” Read More ›
iPhone Users Sue Claiming False Advertising, Cloud Storage Hawking
by Laura Northrup, Consumerist
The iPhone users’ attorneys claim that users aren’t told how much of their already meager storage capacity they will lose when upgrading their phone’s operating system. “Apple fails to disclose that upgrading from iOS 7 to iOS 8 will cost a Device user between 600 MB and 1.3 GB of storage space – a result that no consumer could reasonably anticipate,” they point out. … Once space runs out, the iDevice asks the user whether they’d like to rent some additional iCloud space. “For this service, Apple charges prices ranging from $0.99 to $29.99 per month,” the complaint notes. Read More ›
T-Mobile, AT&T Customers Can Now Request Their $170M In Refunds From Cramming Settlements
by Kate Cox, Consumerist
“Cramming is modern day pickpocketing,” [FCC commissioner Jessica] Rosenworcel said in a statement. “These bogus charges on consumer bills are unfair – and they can add up fast. That’s why these settlements are so important. They give consumers the right to block these fees going forward and get their money back for payments they made in the past.” … Sprint is also facing a lawsuit from a federal agency (the CFPB, this time) over bill-cramming. Read More ›
Auto Industry Galvanized After Record Recall Year
by Bill Vlasic and Hilary Stout, The New York Times
More than 60 million vehicles have been recalled in the United States, double the previous annual record in 2004. In all, there have been about 700 recall announcements — an average of two a day — affecting the equivalent of one in five vehicles on the road. … The attention to safety has also awakened car owners. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the nation’s top auto regulator, is on pace this year to receive 80,000 complaints from consumers about possible defects — about double the average annual number. Read More ›
Data Broker Is Charged With Selling Consumers’ Financial Details To ‘Fraudsters’
by Natasha Singer, New York Times
This week, the Federal Trade Commission filed a lawsuit claiming that a data broker in Nevada sold intimate details about several hundred thousand people, including their Social Security numbers and bank account numbers, to marketers and other companies that had no legitimate need for that data. Read More ›