Press Releases
08/19/2026
Attorney General Tong Announces $275,000 Settlement with TaxAct Over Improper Sharing of Sensitive Taxpayer Data with Meta and Google
(Hartford, CT) – Attorney General William Tong today announced a $275,000 settlement with Texas-based online tax preparation company TaxAct over improper release of sensitive taxpayer data to Meta and Google.
An investigation by the Office of the Attorney General found that between January 2018 and December 2022, TaxAct used third-party tracking technologies through Meta and Google for internal data analytics and marketing. During that time, TaxAct improperly disclosed to Meta and Google detailed financial information for its customers, including rounded adjusted gross income, rounded tax refunds and/or taxes owed, and certain types of income and deductions, including number of dependents and whether taxpayers made charitable contributions, or had investment income or mortgage or student loan interest. TaxAct’s contract with Meta provided no limit on Meta’s ability to use the data for its own purposes or to share that data with other third parties. TaxAct did not inform taxpayers before sharing their information. During that time, TaxAct’s privacy notices promised to safeguard consumer privacy and to prohibit third parties from sharing TaxAct data.
TaxAct, which is now under new ownership, cooperated with the state investigation.
“Taxpayers trusted TaxAct with their most sensitive financial records for one specific purpose—to prepare their tax returns. Behind the scenes, our investigation showed that TaxAct abused that trust and allowed Meta and Google access to sensitive taxpayer data. This was a breach of trust that could have exposed taxpayers to potential scams and financial harm. In addition to the financial penalty, this settlement forces TaxAct to deploy groundbreaking new safeguards to monitor and govern third-party tracking on their site to ensure this never happens again,” said Attorney General William Tong.
In addition to the $275,000 payment to the state, the settlement requires strong new third-party tracking compliance terms, including creation of a review committee and written policies and procedures to govern and approve the use of any new third-party tracking technologies or changes to existing tracking. The settlement further requires data documentation recording data points tracked by third-party technologies and a tag monitoring system that will regularly scan the company’s website to ensure third-party technologies are functioning as approved. Finally, the settlement requires that TaxAct obtain two independent third-party audits of its third-party tracking compliance program to ensure its trackers are functioning as approved by the review committee.
In December 2024, TaxAct entered into a $14.5 million class action settlement that provides financial relief to impacted taxpayers.
Assistant Attorneys General Laura Martella and Patrick Kania and Deputy Associate Attorney General Michele Lucan, Chief of the Privacy Section assisted the Attorney General in this matter.
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