On February 27, 2019, the American Federal Trade Commission (FTC) published a proposed stipulated order for civil penalties and other reliefs against Musical.ly for violation of the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) by collecting personal information from kids without parental consent. The $5.7 million civil penalty is the FTC’s largest ever under COPPA.
All “Web site or online service directed to children” (which means all commercial Web site or online service – or even a portion – targeting children) shall satisfy COPPA’s requirements.
The Complaint charges that Defendant violated COPPA and the FTC Act by failing to post a privacy policy on its online service providing clear, understandable, and complete notice of its information practices; failing to provide direct notice of its information practices to parents; failing to obtain verifiable parental consent prior to collecting, using, and/or disclosing personal information from children; failing to delete personal information at the request of parents; and retaining personal information longer than reasonably necessary to fulfill the purpose for which the information was collected.
In addition to civil penalty, the FTC ordered Musical.ly to choose either to destroy all personal information associated with user accounts; or to allow users (regardless of age) to transfer their videos to their own devices, and allow users 13 or older to maintain their registration.
More on Musical.ly, Inc. proceeding is available at https://www.ftc.gov…
The [Proposed] stipulated order for civil penalties, permanent injunction, and other relief is available at https://www.ftc.gov…
More on COPPA is available at https://www.technethics.com…
For more information on how privacy to implement privacy policies in your business, contact Francesca Giannoni-Crystal. Thanks to Federica Romanelli.