Collecting Sensitive Data Without User Consent: 10 Major Dutch Online Pharmacies Violate GDPR Requirements – Usercentrics Reports

MUNICH--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Analysis by Usercentrics shows: 10 major Dutch online pharmacies violate GDPR requirements by setting an average number of 23 non-necessary cookies without any user consent. Within the EU 89% of the most significant online pharmacies do not meet GDPR requirements.

Pharmacy webshops constantly process personal data of their visitors and customers, while selling privacy-sensitive products such as antidepressants, diabetes medicines and products related to reproductive health, heart disease or addiction treatments. Usercentrics scanned the 150 most-used pharmacy web stores in the EU, analyzing the extent to which website operators are complying with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

The results were staggering:

• 89% of the most popular online pharmacies do not meet GDPR requirements with regard to obtaining end-user consent before processing personal data through the use of cookies.
• 55% of all non-necessary cookies were activated and in use on the website’s landing page without any user consent.
• 62% of all cookies set without the user’s consent are third-party marketing cookies.

With consumers increasingly demanding enhanced data privacy from the companies they do business with, these results are particularly worrying for a privacy-sensitive sector.

Breaking consumer trust, risking damage to brand reputation and breaching core GDPR requirements, the pharma e-commerce market in Europe – poised to grow by almost 9.5 billion euros during 2020-2024 according to research from Technavio – paints a worrying picture of data privacy compliance failures.

Tilman Harmeling, Entrepreneur in residence of Usercentrics states: “Our deep scanning technology revealed major GDPR compliance failures across the privacy-sensitive online pharmacy industry and highlights the damaging effects on customer relations. In the four years since the GDPR took effect, data privacy has evolved from an obscure legal requirement into a strong consumer demand and metric of brand reputation. Respecting end-user consent through transparent and compliant use of cookies and trackers, is therefore vital for any online business wishing to build consumer trust.”

Full report here.

About Usercentrics

Usercentrics is a global market leader for Consent Management Platforms (CMP). We enable businesses to collect, manage and document user consents on websites and apps to achieve compliance with global privacy regulations while facilitating high consent rates and building customer trust: usercentrics.com.