Even educational games aren’t exempt from collecting (and sharing) children’s data. Video sharing apps (like YouTube) can collect search and viewing history to deliver recommended adverts and videos. Games can analyze a child’s gaming habits and use this information to deliver precisely targeted adverts for their next game, for example. In-app purchases aside, many free apps make money by selling personal data to ad networks.

A study carried out by Compareitech revealed that around 20% of the top 500 Android apps for kids in the Google Play Store collect data that likely breaches COPPA regulations. If developers are using third-party software to collect user data without consent - something that happens more often than you might think, and is often caused by misconfigured settings - they could be breaking the law. Why are kids’ apps collecting data?īut why is kids’ data so valuable, and why are app developers harvesting it? Under the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), app developers must take steps to protect the data of children under 13 using their apps. Others claimed that their apps weren’t specifically marketed to children, despite this being obviously untrue. Many developers surveyed feigned ignorance that children used their apps. Here are just a few different types of data that kids apps could be harvesting on your child: Results revealed that almost a fifth of the kids apps studied collected “personally identifiable information” (such as name, biometrics, birthday), doing so by using “third-party software development kits (SDKs) that were not supposed to be used in child-directed apps.” Around 5% of the apps harvested contact or location data without parental consent, and, worryingly, many apps also transmitted data insecurely.

I’ve used Android phones for 10 years, and I hate these ones the mostĪ study by the Berkley-affiliated International Computer Science Institute looked at thousands of free apps for kids in the Google Play Store. Your Tinder profile is about to change in 3 huge waysĥ things we’d love to see at Google I/O 2023 (but probably won’t)

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