Mount Sinai settles suit alleging hospital system shared data in patient portal on Facebook

Mount Sinai Health System has agreed to pay more than $5 million to participants in a class-action suit who alleged their confidential patient information was shared with Facebook, according to federal court documents.

The network of hospitals that includes Mount Sinai South Nassau in Oceanside has settled with more than 1 million people who logged into the MyChart system between Oct. 27, 2020, and Oct. 27, 2023, according to a complaint filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York in Manhattan on Oct. 30, 2023. The hospital group’s online portal allows users to schedule appointments and access lab and test results among other features.

Under the terms of the settlement, filed in federal court on May 30, Mount Sinai Health System will pay $5,256,588 to 1,314,147 individuals. Class-action members will be eligible for payment if they submit a claim online or by mail by Oct. 14. They also can opt out of or file an objection against the settlement by that date. Judge Paul A. Engelmayer will preside over the final approval hearing for the settlement on Oct. 24.

Participants in the class action "will release any and all claims against Mount Sinai" related to the lawsuit, according to the settlement.

The settlement "is not an admission of any misconduct," reads a statement Lucia L. Lee, vice president of public affairs and media at Mount Sinai Health System, emailed to Newsday on Wednesday evening.

"Mount Sinai Health System prioritizes the protection of patient privacy and is committed to safeguarding the confidentiality of personal health information," the statement reads. "At no time did any of the alleged outside tracking tools gain access to Mount Sinai’s electronic medical record system or Mount Sinai’s patient portal."

The federal complaint alleged that Mount Sinai’s websites used the Facebook Meta Pixel and Conversions Application Programing Interface, which routinely "target specific customers by utilizing data to build incredibly fulsome and robust profiles for the purposes of retargeting and future marketing."

The Meta pixel is code that tracks data such as the text a user types and the amount of time they spend on a webpage and "automatically transmits ... every click, keystroke and intimate detail about their medical symptoms, conditions and treatments" to Meta Platforms, Inc., the parent company of Facebook, the complaint reads. Facebook uses this information to "create targeted advertisements based on the medical conditions" and other health information of visitors to Mount Sinai websites, according to the complaint.

Mount Sinai filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit last year, but the case proceeded and discovery was conducted from September through March, according to the settlement. Both sides notified the court on April 4 that an agreement was reached before the formal settlement was filed the following month.

It is not yet known how much money each member of the class action will receive after attorney’s fees and other distributions detailed in the settlement.

Attorney James Bilsborrow of Weitz & Luxenberg and attorneys at the Chicago and New York offices of the Almeida Law Group listed as representing members of the class action could not be reached Wednesday evening.