Meta Platforms Tracks Consumer Interactions with North Carolina DMV Payment Portal, Class Action Says

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A proposed class action alleges Meta Platforms has secretly tracked North Carolina residents’ communications with the payment portal for the state’s Department of Motor Vehicles, including new car registrations, disability placard renewals, payments and more. 

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The 22-page complaint alleges Meta tracks North Carolinians’ interactions with the state DMV’s online payment portal, Payments.NCDOT.gov, “down to the very last button click” and uses this information to help deliver targeted ads across Facebook and Instagram. 

According to the case, this surreptitious tracking is a violation of the federal Drivers’ Privacy Protection Act since neither Meta nor the North Carolina DMV asked drivers for their express written permission to obtain or use their highly sensitive data. 

When a user visits Facebook.com, Meta secretly installs a tracking code, called the Meta Pixel, onto their web browser and many of the sites they visit, the filing relays. This allows the company to collect information about who a user is and what they do when they are off the Facebook website, including actions they take on Payments.NCDOT.gov, the case alleges. 

“In recent years, more and more of the North Carolina DMV’s work has moved online, from voter registrations to personalized plate orders. In the wake of the COVID-19 Pandemic, the myNCDMV online payments portal expanded to include even greater service offerings,” the suit shares. “At the same time, however, myNCDMV hosts the Meta Tracking Pixel to allow Meta to surveil what North Carolinians do when they are on its website to help Meta deliver targeted advertisements to its users.” 

Per the complaint, the Drivers’ Privacy Protection Act prohibits companies such as Meta from knowingly obtaining or using personal information from a motor vehicle record for a purpose not expressly permitted by law. 

“Obtaining and using drivers’ personal information for direct marketing is not permitted by law,” the lawsuit states. 

Under the Drivers’ Privacy Protection Act, a “motor vehicle record” covers any record that pertains to a driver’s permit, title, registration, or ID card issued by a department of motor vehicles, the suit explains. Certain highly restricted information, such as a person’s medical or disability history, can never be used for marketing under the law, the case adds. 

The lawsuit says that the myNCDMV website transmits to Meta three distinct events—PageView, Microdata and Button Click. The PageView event, the case says, tells Meta the specific URL a driver has navigated to, which often reveals what the page is about as, for instance, it might contain the words “disability,” “handicap” and “placard,” the case relays. The Microdata event tells Meta the title of a webpage, while the Button Click event informs the company of “every single button the driver has clicked on,” the suit shares. 

“These three custom Meta Tracking Pixel events are present on almost all https://payments.ncdot.gov webpages and convey a trove of information about a driver’s personal business with the DMV. This includes whether a particular driver is seeking to renew a disability placard or a car registration, order a custom license plate, request a driver’s license hearing, and various other transactions.” 

The lawsuit looks to cover all persons in the United States who have a Facebook account and visited https://Payments.NCDOT.gov/ after September 6, 2019. 

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