Google Fined $170 Million for Violating Children’s Privacy on YouTube

Google has agreed to pay a record amount to settle accusations that YouTube broke the law when it consciously tracked and sold ads targeted at children, according to the Federal Trade Commission and the state of New York.

CNN reports the $170 million settlement involves the largest-ever penalty under the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, which YouTube allegedly violated. Google posted a blog regarding the settlement stating, “We know how important it is to provide children, families and family creators the best experience possible on YouTube and we are committed to getting it right.”

Google also confirmed it will use machine learning algorithms to proactively identify children’s content on the platform and in the next four months, data collected from all children’s content will be treated as though it were coming from a child viewer.

“This means that we will limit data collection and use on videos made for kids only to what is needed to support the operation of the service,” says Google. “We will also stop serving personalized ads on this content entirely, and some features will no longer be available on this type of content, like comments and notifications.”

However, some critics including a number of FTC commissioners, are saying the settlement with YouTube is not enough.

Under the agreement, which also involves the office of New York Attorney General Letitia James, Google will pay $136 million to the federal government and $34 million to the state of New York. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀

According to the article, YouTube will also be forced to require creators of children’s videos to declare whether their content is aimed at kids, which will then signal YouTube to suspend targeted advertising.

“This obligation exceeds what any third party in the marketplace currently is required to do,” FTC Chairman Joseph Simons and Commissioner Christine Wilson stated in a joint statement. “It represents the first and only mandated requirement on a platform or third party to seek actual knowledge of whether the content is child-directed.”

“Google and YouTube knowingly and illegally monitored, tracked, and served targeted ads to young children just to keep advertising dollars rolling in,” New York Attorney General Letitia James said in a statement. “These companies put children at risk and abused their power, which is why we are imposing major reforms to their practices and making them pay one of the largest settlements for a privacy matter in U.S. history.”

YouTube has repeatedly struggled ways to handle controversial content aimed at children. Nevertheless, the FTC has announced it will be conducting periodic reviews of its rules under COPPA to ensure it is protecting children.