FTC sues Hims & Hers for allegedly sharing patients’ medical data with advertisers Meta and Snap

The Federal Trade Commission is suing healthcare giant Hims & Hers for allegedly sharing its customers’ medical and healthcare information with advertisers and tech giants, like Meta and Snap, as well as for misleading consumers its privacy practices.

The lawsuit is the federal consumer watchdog’s latest crackdown in recent years on healthcare companies that sensitive information with outside companies without their customers’ knowledge. Hims & Hers, now a publicly traded company , provides prescription medication for sexual wellness, mental health conditions, weight loss, and other issues, and as such handles a large amount of sensitive patient data.

The FTC also accused Hims & Hers of deceptive billing, and drawing up policies that allegedly made it difficult for customers to cancel, in violation of federal consumer protection laws.

The FTC has previously taken action against telehealth startup Cerebral, alcohol recovery provider Monument , as well as data giant GoodRx and therapy provider BetterHelp . These companies were similarly accused of sharing patients’ sensitive data through their websites to third-party tech giants and advertisers.

The use of pixel-sized trackers has previously revealed how people’s sensitive data gets shared with the companies who provide the code, highlighting how misconfigurations can result in unwanted data collection.

In 2024, TechCrunch found that the U.S. Postal Service was sharing logged-in users’ addresses with Meta, , and Snap by using their pixel tracking code. The USPS removed the code soon after.