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PUBLIC TESTIMONY

Testimony by Leonie Haimson, Co-chair of Parent Coalition For Student Privacy

2:03:46

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3 min

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Leonie Haimson testifies about privacy concerns with Talkspace, a mental health service contracted by the NYC Department of Health. She highlights issues with data sharing practices and potential violations of student privacy laws.

Haimson's organization found that Talkspace shares user data with numerous third parties and ad trackers
A class action lawsuit has been filed against Talkspace in California for sharing minors' mental health information
The Parent Coalition For Student Privacy is calling for the Talkspace contract to be cancelled and the website taken down until privacy issues are addressed

Leonie Haimson

2:03:46

Thank you, chair Lee, chair Joseph, and other members of these committees.

2:03:49

My name is Leiani Haimson.

2:03:51

I'm the cochair of a national organization called the Parent Coalition For Student Privacy.

2:03:56

On September 10th, along with the New York Civil Liberties Union and AI for Families, we sent a letter to the mayor, the Department of Education, and the Commissioner of Health expressing our deep concerns with the way in which Talkspace allows for the sharing of its users' personal information with unnamed third parties for marketing purposes in a manner that would be illegal if the contract was signed by the DOE rather than the Department of Health.

2:04:19

In our letter, we also pointed out that Talkspace has been criticized for its lax privacy policies by Massachusetts senator Elizabeth Warren and her colleagues and also by users for delivering inconsistent and irresponsible services.

2:04:33

Our letter was covered by the Daily News, Chalkbeat, and others.

2:04:36

On September 23rd, the Department of Health responded arguing that they did not have to abide by the state student privacy law since they were not an education agency, but assuring us that their contract was no less protective.

2:04:49

Since we sent our initial letter, we discovered that when a New York City student visits the TeamSpace website on their phone, Their personally identifiable information is automatically shared with 15 ad trackers and 30 cookies as well as Facebook, Amazon, Meta, Google, and Microsoft among others, which we saw from using the Blacklight privacy audit tool.

2:05:09

These findings were later confirmed by a security company that does privacy analyses.

2:05:14

We also learned that in California, class action lawsuit has been filed against Talkspace, pointing out how the personal information of its clients is shared with TikTok, including the mental health information of minors.

2:05:26

These findings are particularly concerning given how the city is suing many of these same companies for undermining children's mental health and designing their platforms to be addictive to maximize their revenues.

2:05:38

On October 16th, we sent a follow-up letter to the Department of Health asking for a meeting and for the Talkspace website to be immediately taken down until it is fixed to stop collecting and sharing children's personal information with ad trackers and social media companies.

2:05:53

Expired.

Linda Lee

2:05:54

Sorry.

2:05:54

Go you can go ahead and finish up.

Leonie Haimson

2:05:57

Okay.

2:05:57

Thank you.

2:05:59

Today, I just checked again with the Teenspace website and found that the website is still sharing personal information with 14 ad trackers, 30 30 third party cookies, and numerous social media companies.

2:06:11

The meanwhile, the Department of Health officials keep promising to meet with us, but they'd keep on putting off the meeting.

2:06:18

We believe that they should cancel their contract with Talkspace and demand that they take their website down until all these unacceptable practices are halted.

2:06:28

The need to support children's mental health is critical, but allowing their personal information to be shared and misused in this way for risk risks further undermining it.

2:06:37

Moreover, the Team Space example provides evidence of how the city should not be outsourcing these critical services to for profit companies like Talkspace and that the protection of student privacy must always be paramount.

2:06:50

Thank you for the opportunity to testify today.

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Testimony by William Juhn, Senior Staff Attorney at Lawyers for the Public Interest