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2. California
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4. Psychologist Referral Service
5. BetterHelp (current page)

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BUSINESS PROFILEFORBETTERHELP

Psychologist Referral Service
Multi Location Business
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ADDITIONAL BUSINESS INFORMATION

Government Actions:
Government Action: BBB reports on known government actions involving business’
marketplace conduct:
FTC vs BetterHelp

In the hierarchy of confidential data, health information ranks right up there.
And in the hierarchy of health information, details about a person’s mental
health may be among the most confidential. But according to the FTC, that’s not
how online counseling service BetterHelp viewed it. The FTC says the company
repeatedly pushed people to take an Intake Questionnaire and hand over sensitive
health information through unavoidable prompts. And it promised to keep that
information private through statements like: “Rest assured – any information
provided in this questionnaire will stay private between you and your
counselor.” But from the FTC’s perspective, a truthful statement would have been
“Rest assured – we plan to share your information with major advertising
platforms, including Facebook, Snapchat, Criteo, and Pinterest.” A proposed FTC
settlement with BetterHelp includes $7.8 million for partial refunds for
BetterHelp customers and conveys an unmistakable message about just how
seriously the FTC takes this kind of betrayal of trust.

BetterHelp offers online counseling services through that name and through
specialized versions for particular audiences – for example, Pride Counseling
for members of the LGBTQ community, Faithful Counseling for people of the
Christian faith, Terappeuta for Spanish-speaking clients, and Teen Counseling
for teenagers who enroll with parental permission.

Since BetterHelp was founded, more than two million people have signed up,
entrusting the company with their personal information, much of it related to
the status of their health – and their mental health. For example, the company’s
Intake Questionnaire asked people to disclose if they’re “experiencing
overwhelming sadness, grief, or depression,” if they’re having thoughts they
“would be better off dead or hurting [themselves] in some way,” if they’re
taking medication, and if they’ve been in therapy before.

To assuage concerns about revealing personal information online or through an
app, BetterHelp made a variety of confidentiality promises to consumers.
Visitors to the site were told at the outset that the company collected “general
and anonymous background information about you and the issues you’d like to deal
with in online therapy” so the person can be matched “with the most suitable
therapist.” Although the exact wording changed over time, the company assured
people that aside from a few narrow uses related to providing online counseling
services, their private information would remain private. In addition, for more
than three years, BetterHelp told people thinking about signing up for Faithful
Counseling, Pride Counseling, or Teen Counseling that their email addresses
would be “kept strictly private” and “never shared, sold or disclosed to
anyone.”

Despite those promises, the FTC says BetterHelp used a wide variety of tactics
to share the health information of over 7 million consumers with platforms like
Facebook, Snapchat, Criteo, and Pinterest for the purpose of advertising. You’ll
want to read the complaint for details, but here are just a few examples. In
2017, BetterHelp allegedly uploaded the email addresses of all current and
former clients to Facebook – nearly 2 million in total – to target them with ads
to refer their Facebook friends to BetterHelp for mental health services. During
another period, the FTC says BetterHelp disclosed to Facebook for advertising
purposes the previous therapy of 1.5 million people who visited or used
BetterHelp’s site. The source of that information: their responses to the intake
question “Have you been in counseling or therapy before?”

But that’s not all. According to the complaint, BetterHelp broke its privacy
promises by disclosing to Snapchat the IP and email addresses of approximately
5.6 million former visitors to target them with BetterHelp ads. In addition, for
a six-month period, the company disclosed to Criteo the email addresses of over
70,000 visitors – including people who had looked into Pride Counseling and
Faithful Counseling. Similarly, for a one-year period, BetterHelp disclosed
visitors’ email addresses to Pinterest. What was in it for BetterHelp? According
to the complaint, “Using this health information for advertising, [BetterHelp]
has brought in hundreds of thousands of new Users, resulting in millions of
dollars in additional revenue.”

When a news site revealed in February 2020 that BetterHelp was sharing
consumers’ health data with third parties, people complained to the company. As
one person put it, “I have not given ANY consent to share my information with
ANYONE. ESPECIALLY ads targeting my mental health ‘weakness.’” How did
BetterHelp respond? The FTC says the company doubled down on deception by
falsely denying it had shared consumers’ personal information – including their
health information – with third parties.

The eight-count complaint details how the FTC says BetterHelp’s allegedly
deceptive and unfair practices harmed consumers. The proposed order in the case
will require BetterHelp to pay $7.8 million that will be used to provide partial
refunds to people who signed up for and paid for BetterHelp’s services between
August 1, 2017, and December 31, 2020. In addition, the proposed order prohibits
BetterHelp from sharing consumers’ health data for advertising or sharing their
personal information for re-targeting – serving ads to consumers who had visited
the company’s site or used its app. The settlement also includes provisions to
limit BetterHelp’s data sharing in the future. The company must contact affected
consumers directly about the case and must direct third parties to delete
consumers’ health and other personal data that BetterHelp shared with them. Once
the proposed settlement is published in the Federal Register, you’ll have 30
days to file a public comment.

The case offers a key guidance point for other companies: Honor your privacy
promises. Tell the truth and get consumers’ affirmative express consent before
sharing any health information.

Here are other takeaways to take into consideration.

“Personal information” may be “health information” simply due to the nature of
the product or service. Generally speaking, an email address might not be
considered “health information” – unless, of course, the source of the
information is a health-related service. In the case of BetterHelp, most people
visited the site to seek mental health assistance. Therefore, just the fact that
BetterHelp, Pride Counseling, or Faithful Counseling was the source of their
email or IP address revealed highly sensitive information to third parties. The
message for others in the industry: Context counts.

Institute policies, practices, and procedures to protect health information. As
the FTC’s complaint makes clear, a lack of appropriate safeguards can lead to
unfair and deceptive practices related to the collection, use, and disclosure of
health information. For example, the complaint alleged that BetterHelp failed to
have written policies and procedures for protecting the privacy of health
information. And it failed to properly train and supervise employees that
handled that health information. It also didn’t get consumers’ affirmative
express consent before disclosing their health information to third parties and
it failed to contractually limit those third parties from using the data for
their own purposes.

Ditch deceptive design. As the complaint discusses in detail, while BetterHelp
moved consumers through a series of prominent prompts in an effort to get them
to turn over their personal information, the company put privacy “disclosures”
behind hard-to-find and hard-to-read links. Even a portion of the website with a
link to its privacy policy included this reassurance: “We never sell or rent any
information you share with us.” Once BetterHelp made that promise, how likely is
it that consumers would pursue the issue further? What’s more, the FTC says even
if people were able to navigate to the company’s privacy policy, they still
weren’t given the straight story about how BetterHelp turned over their highly
personal information to advertising platforms.

“Slinging hash” won’t necessarily protect consumers’ personal data. Although
BetterHelp hashed people’s email addresses before sharing them with third
parties – in other words, converted them into a sequence of letters and numbers
through a cryptographic tool – the hashing was done just to hide the addresses
in case of a security breach. The FTC says BetterHelp knew that third parties
like Facebook would effectively undo the hashing to reveal the email addresses
of people who had gone to the BetterHelp site for mental health services. Once
Facebook had those addresses, it would easily match them to the email of people
with Facebook accounts. What can other companies learn from that example?
Certainly there are instances where hashing may be called for, but it won’t
protect the privacy of consumers’ information if third parties can un-hash the
data.

Monitor data flows to all third parties your site or app may transmit to via web
beacons, pixels, or other tracking technologies. It’s illegal to make privacy
promises to consumers without taking into account any information that’s going
to third parties through various forms of ad tech. It boils down to this: Don’t
make privacy promises that your practices don’t live up to.

Click here for details
Read more about Government Actions
See all additional business information

AT-A-GLANCE

CONTACT INFORMATION

990 Villa St

Mountain View, CA 94041-1236

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Visit Website
(888) 688-9296

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BBB RATING & ACCREDITATION

A-BBB rating

Accredited Since: 12/7/2015

Years in Business: 10

Customer Reviews are not used in the calculation of BBB Rating

Reasons for BBB Rating

CUSTOMER REVIEWS

4.06/5stars

Average of 546 Customer Reviews

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CUSTOMER COMPLAINTS

523 complaints closed in last 3 years

176 complaints closed in last 12 months

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File a Complaint

BBB RATING & ACCREDITATION

A-BBB rating

Accredited Since: 12/7/2015

Years in Business: 10

Customer Reviews are not used in the calculation of BBB Rating

Reasons for BBB Rating

RELATED CATEGORIES

* Psychologist Referral Service
* Therapy

OVERVIEW

Online counseling and therapy service. The secure website and mobile app
facilitate messages, chats, voice calls, and video sessions with licensed,
accredited, and board-certified counselors.

PRODUCTS & SERVICES

Therapy referral service. Our mission is to provide everyone with private access
to professional counseling: anytime, anywhere.

BUSINESS DETAILS

This is a multi-location business. Need to find a different location?

Location of This Business990 Villa St, Mountain View, CA 94041-1236

BBB File Opened:3/13/2014
Years in Business:10
Business Started:11/1/2012
Business Incorporated:10/24/2012
Accredited Since:12/7/2015
Licensing Information:
This business is in an industry that may require professional licensing, bonding
or registration. BBB encourages you to check with the appropriate agency to be
certain any requirements are currently being met.
Type of Entity:Corporation
Alternate Business Name
* Compile, Inc.
* Better Help

Business Management
* Ms. Sahar Naim, Director of Operations

Contact Information

Principal

* Ms. Sahar Naim, Director of Operations

Customer Contact

* Mr. Alon Matas, CEO
* Ms. Sahar Naim, Director of Operations

Additional Contact Information

Website Addresses

* https://www.betterhelp.com/start/?utm_source=AdWords&utm_medium=Search_PPC_m&utm_term=betterhelp_e&u

www.bbb.org Open in urlscan Pro 54.90.19.185 Public Scan

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www.bbb.org Open in urlscan Pro
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