Cox Media fined after bragging it spied on users through their phones

An exceptionally strange controversy has come back to haunt Cox Media and two marketing companies, which claimed they were secretly listening to users through phones and smart devices — despite little evidence that they actually could. On Thursday, the Federal Trade Commission announced that Cox, MindSift and 1010 Digital Works would pay a total of $930,000 to settle allegations that they actually lied about spying on people to target ads.

As told Techdirt A few years ago, Cox publicly bragged about a system called Voice Data in 2023, telling potential digital marketing clients that they could ensure that “every casual conversation between two consumers becomes a tool for you to target, retarget and retain customers.” He compared technology to an episode of Black mirror and described it as a real-life version of the persistent, largely unfounded rumor that social media companies regularly listen to users through phone microphones. Cox backtracked and denied listening in on any conversations, but 404 Media has released several internal pitch decks making essentially the same highly dystopian claim.

At the time, there were serious doubts about whether this was a reality, and the FTC’s complaints confirm it. “In fact, this service did not listen to consumers’ conversations or use voice data – nor did it accurately place ads in the locations customers wanted,” it says in its press release. “Instead, the service provided by the companies was to resell – for a significant markup – mailing lists obtained from other data brokers.” The agency also claims that the companies lied about consumers opting into this system – so even if they could spy on people, he claims, they would still have broken the law.