The US DOJ Wants Identities and Addresses of Over 100,000 Users of a Car App

The US DOJ is demanding the data of all users, equating to over 100,000 people, of the EZ Lynk app over alleged violations of the Clean Air Act, which the company denies.

The alleged violation is due to EZ Lynk providing "defeat devices" that allow users to bypass emissions controls in vehicles.

EZ Lynk disputes that its primary purpose is to circumvent emissions laws, stating that its apps are intended to allow car owners to tweak their car and monitor its performance.

In a letter to the court, first reported by Inside EPA, the DOJ demanded the data of all people who purchased the device from Apple, Google, Amazon, and Walmart.

This equates to hundreds of thousands of people's personal information.

Inside EPA calls the move "nearly unprecedented," citing the only one other similar case from 2019 when the DOJ wanted to identify about 10,000 purchasers of gun scope software.

The EZ Lynk case is proceeding even as the Trump administration and the EPA have moved to drop similar cases.

Investigating the claim that EZ Lynk's devices "does not require identifying each person who has used the product." The case represents a clear overreach by the government to collect troves of personally identifiable information that's not needed.

The letter to the court notes that Apple and Google oppose the request.

EZ Lynk told Inside EPA "Our users’ privacy means everything to us, and we are fully committed to our fight to protect it.”

The case shows a big everyday privacy vulnerability: when you purchase items with your credit or debit card, or sign in to your rewards account, all of your purchases can be tied back to you.

Similarly, Google and Apple require an account in order to purchase and install apps from their app stores. They have a record of all the apps you have installed from their respective app stores and they could willingly provide that information or be forced to via a government subpoena.

Last year in 2025, Apple and Google were sent demands from the government to take down apps such as ICEBlock that allowed people to see where ICE agents were spotted.

The government could have easily demanded the personal information of anyone who downloaded the apps as well.

We need better privacy protections in App Stores, especially the ability to download free apps from these stores without having to make an account first.