Large social media companies and streaming platforms, including Amazon, YouTube, Meta's Facebook, and TikTok, engage in widespread surveillance of users to profit from their personal data, jeopardizing privacy and failing to protect children, according to a Federal Trade Commission (FTC) report released Thursday.
The 129-page report scrutinizes how these major tech companies collect, use, and sell users' data, including the data of children and teens. It reveals that many companies store massive amounts of information on both users and non-users, with some even ignoring deletion requests.
“The report lays out how social media and video streaming companies harvest an enormous amount of Americans' personal data and monetize it to the tune of billions of dollars a year,” FTC Chair Lina Khan said. “While lucrative for the companies, these surveillance practices can endanger people's privacy, threaten their freedoms, and expose them to a host of harms, from identity theft to stalking.”
The FTC found that the business models of these platforms rely heavily on the mass collection of personal data, primarily through targeted ads, which generate most of their revenue. “With few meaningful guardrails, companies are incentivized to develop ever-more invasive methods of collection,” the report noted.
The risks to children are particularly alarming, according to Khan. Child advocates have long criticized federal privacy laws for not holding social media platforms accountable if their products aren't specifically targeted at children. Critics also argue that big tech companies’ claims of not knowing how many kids use their platforms are disingenuous.
The report suggests that federal legislation could limit data collection and provide consumers with more control over their information.
In July, the Senate passed the Kids Online Safety Act, a bipartisan bill aimed at protecting children by requiring companies to enhance privacy protections and give parents more control over content their kids can access.
The FTC's report follows a lawsuit filed by attorneys general from 33 states accusing Meta of keeping children online as long as possible to collect their personal data and sell it to advertisers. Meta maintains that no one under 13 is allowed on Instagram and that it deletes accounts of underage users when discovered, but it acknowledged the challenges of verifying users' ages.
This issue gained attention in 2021 when former Meta employee Frances Haugen leaked internal research showing that Instagram worsens suicidal thoughts and eating disorders in some teenage girls.
Read the FTC report: here.
