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| Life360 Makes Millions of Dollars Selling Location Data |
According to The Markup, Life360 products are listed as home security apps, and the company was selling location data to its 31 million customers (including children) as of 2016.
Life360 is a popular family safety app used by 33 million people around the world. It was marketed as a way for parents to use their cell phones to keep track of their children's activities.
Markup understands that the app sells children and family whereabouts data to dozens of data brokers who sell the data to just about anyone who wants to buy it.
Life360 is one of the largest data sources in the $12 billion phone location tracking industry.
In November, the company announced that it had signed a deal to acquire well-known item-tracking company Tile for $205 million.
He said he plans to have a dual US listing (currently listed on the Australian Stock Exchange) next year.
The Life360 app is configured by default to consent to the sale of user data. Users must log out in the app settings to prevent their personal data from being passed on.
When announcing the acquisition of Tile, Tile identified as an independent company led by the current CEO, and the company indicated its intention to connect Tile accounts to the Life360 app.
She said that the API allows customers to integrate the entire family and their company into a single interface.
According to data from The Markup, Life360 generated nearly $700,000 in retail location data in 2016. This could become a more comprehensive source of revenue for the company in the future.
The company's CEO confirmed that despite incurring a total loss of $16.3 million last year, sales in 2020 will be around $16 million.
Tile's response to the question about the potential impact of the transaction on data: Tile does not sell any personally identifiable information, and we have full support from Life360 and promise to continue to do so.
Life360 contains location data from Tile. Receipt
Location data makers like Cuebiq, X-Mode, and SafeGraph pay to track customers who visit Life360.
The company's CEO said Life360 will not disclose any information to government agencies. But once the data is purchased, there is no way to comment on any other company's practices. Or how the company handles data from other sources.
Life360 prohibits tracking of individual customer information in its contracts with data purchasers. The CEO said he was not aware of any cases where customers were allegedly re-identified. He noted that Life360 follows the best data protection practices in the industry.
Few of the apps disclose which companies they share data with because they are not legally required to do so.
The app does not tell users where their data has gone. The companies that provided the data refused to tell their customers how to get the data.
The data brokers that process the location data and the apps they collect the data from are trade secrets. This Location Data Industry Report helps explain how companies like Life360 see user data needs as opportunities.