Verizon, AT&T, and T-Mobile were selling your location data, and they can finally be punished for it

It's been two years in the making, but the US Supreme Court has finally made the ruling we all wanted — yes, your carrier can be punished by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) for selling your real-time location data to people.

This is a huge win for consumers in the US, as it means your data is now slightly safer than it was, as carriers will no longer be able to get away with selling your location data to third-parties.

Supreme Court rules on the side of the FCC

This case stems from a dispute between the FCC, and AT&T and Verizon. In 2024, the FCC discovered carriers had been selling customer location data to third-party aggregators, who then sold it on further.

This came to light when a Mississippi sheriff used a service called Securus to track the phones of suspects, instead of getting a court order, as would be more usual. After investigating that case, the FCC ruled that AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, and Verizon had not done enough to protect customer data, as they were supposed to do under the 1996 Telecommunications Act.

AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile were fined around $57 million, $47 million, and $92 million respectively. Due to its acquisition of the brand, T-Mobile also received Sprint's fine, which is why T-Mobile's fine is so much larger.

AT&T and Verizon contested the fine, claiming that it infringed on their Seventh Amendment rights to a jury trial, and so, the case began.

The US Supreme Court disagreed with AT&T and Verizon's reasoning, saying that any fined company could refuse to pay the fine, which would lead the FCC to file a lawsuit within five years — leading to the jury trial the carriers wanted.

T-Mobile was hoping to challenge its fine on a similar basis, and this ruling most likely closes that door too.

What does this mean for you and your carrier? Well, it means carriers will at least be held accountable for selling off your location data, so even if they don't stop doing so, the FCC can fine them for doing so whenever they're caught.

Will they stop? Well, that remains to be seen.