Google and several other companies are accused of tracking activity without parental consent
Dec. 29, 2022, London: A US appeals court on Wednesday revived a lawsuit accusing Alphabet Inc’s Google and several other companies of violating the privacy of children under age 13 by tracking their YouTube activity without parental consent to send them targeted advertising. The 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals in Seattle said Congress did not intend to pre-empt state law-based privacy claims by adopting the federal Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, or COPPA.
That law gives the Federal Trade Commission and state attorneys general, but not private plaintiffs, the authority to regulate the online collection of personal data about children under age 13. The lawsuit alleged that Google’s data collection violated similar state laws and that YouTube content providers such as Hasbro Inc, Mattel Inc, the Cartoon Network and DreamWorks Animation lured children to their channels, knowing they would be tracked.
Lawyers for Google and the content providers did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The children’s lawyers did not immediately respond to similar requests.
In October 2019, Google agreed to pay $170 million to settle charges by the FTC and New York Attorney General Letitia James that YouTube illegally collected children’s data without parental consent. The plaintiffs in the San Francisco case said Google began complying with COPPA in January 2020. Their lawsuit sought damages for YouTube users aged 16 and younger from July 2013 to April 2020.
