The Federal Trade Commission has been eating its Wheaties.
Although a judge in Idaho just dismissed the commission’s privacy case against Kochava, you can bet your booties the FTC is going to refile.
And, rather more dramatically, the FTC is proposing a series of modifications to its 2020 post-Cambridge Analytica consent decree with Facebook (from the pre-Meta days) that would have a tremendous impact on how the company does business – including a “blanket prohibition” against monetizing the data of children under 18 across all of Meta’s services.
Specifically, Meta is accused of (deep breath) violating its 2020 consent order with the FTC, misleading parents about their ability to control who their children can communicate with through the Messenger Kids app and misrepresenting the access it gave certain app developers to private user data.
An independent assessor tasked with reviewing whether Meta’s privacy program satisfies the requirements of the 2020 order also identified “several gaps and weaknesses” in the program, although most of the details have been redacted.
If the FTC is successful in its bid to modify the 2020 consent order, Meta would be barred from releasing new or updating existing products, services or features without first getting written confirmation from the assessor that its privacy program is “in full compliance” with the order.
Yes, but …
Meta, of course, denies the allegations.
Andy Stone, Meta’s director of policy communications, was rather huffy in his response, calling the FTC’s actions “a political stunt” as part of an effort to “usurp the authority of Congress” by singling out “one American company while allowing Chinese companies, like TikTok, to operate without constraint on American soil.”
A few points worth considering, however:
1. I’m no apologist for TikTok, but the company (then known as Musica.ly) has been under an FTC consent decree since 2019 after paying $5.7 million to settle allegations that it illegally collected the personal information of children.
2. This isn’t the first FTC consent decree that Facebook/Meta has been accused of violating. Facebook was also found to be in violation of a 2012 consent order barring the company from misrepresenting its privacy practices.
3. One would be forgiven for wondering whether a prohibition against monetizing the data of users under 18 will become a moot point soon enough. Meta itself acknowledges that “most young adults perceive Facebook as a place for people in their 40s and 50s.” Oof.
Settling in