The state of California filed a lawsuit late last week against Delta Airlines, alleging that the company failed to include a privacy policy in its mobile app. Those privacy policy regulations that you skim through or skip over entirely aren’t quite as unnecessary as you may think.

According to CIO.com:

Since 2010, Delta has distributed a mobile application called “Fly Delta” that allows people to manage their bookings. …The application collects information such as a person’s name, phone number, birth date, email address, frequent flyer account number and pin code, photo and geo-location data. It is alleged in the lawsuit that Delta customers do not know how their data is collected or used by the airline.

By violating California’s Online Privacy Protection Act, Delta faces a $2,500 fine for EACH time the mobile application is downloaded. Multiply that by the millions of times Fly Delta has been downloaded by Californians via Google Play and Apple iTunes, and this lawsuit could get real pricey, real fast.

California is the only state with such a law in place, and Attorney General Kamala Harris is taking the violation seriously: “California law is clear that mobile apps collecting personal information need privacy policies, and that the users of those apps deserve to know what is being done with their personal information.”

Do you pay attention to the Terms of Service when you download new mobile apps?