COPPA
KidSwitch: identifying kids in apps and sites
Every day over 170,000 kids go online for the first time, mostly using an internet that was only ever designed for adults. So it’s very easy for kids to find the wrong content; or to look at the right content, but on a platform which wrongly assumes they’re adults. Historically… Read More
#Kidtech Episode 10: Dona Fraser, Director of Children’s Advertising Review Unit
Click here to listen! Hosted in the Radio Waves building in New York – the original home of Nikola Tesla – Dylan sits down with Dona Fraser, Director of CARU, the children’s arm of the advertising industry’s self-regulatory group. An experienced data privacy and entertainment lawyer, Dona… Read More
5 product development challenges of building a new category
I posted earlier about my functional CTO story, detailing how my role of CTO evolved over time which can be found here. It’s one challenge to be CTO in a ‘normal’ startup and quite a separate challenge to also be at the forefront of a new category. Read More
3 questions every kids-focused brand should ask their media partners
Under GDPR-K and COPPA you are responsible for any data collection that happens on your site, or by your brand, even if by a third party. These are the questions you should be asking all of your agency partners (e.g. any party that plans your kid-focused campaigns or implements your… Read More
SafeFam certification helps brands work more safely with young YouTubers
YouTube is a challenge for brands. On one hand, despite the fact that YouTube is an over-13 platform, it is one of the best places to reach under-13 audiences at scale. The vast subscriber bases of channels such as Sis VS Bro and Ryan ToysReview have sparked an increase in the number of kid-focused channels on the platform, and sponsored collaborations are beneficial to both the influencers and the brands. Read More
COPPA-compliant programmatic advertising with our KidSafe Filter
The recent enforcement action against Oath’s ad exchange (formerly known as AOL) for breaching COPPA has put a spotlight on programmatic advertising to children. The case highlighted some important issues including the fact that using the ‘COPPA flag’ does not work. In fact, the only guaranteed way for… Read More
TikTok COPPA fine ups the stakes in kids digital privacy
The FTC dramatically upped the ante on COPPA enforcement this week with a record-setting fine of $5.7m against the app formerly known as Musical.ly (now TikTok). The settlement says TikTok breached COPPA by knowingly collecting personal information from children without first obtaining parental consent, as required by the law. Read More
5 things we learned while refining Verifiable Parental Consent for kids apps
Apps and games that need to collect personally identifiable information (PII) from kids require the parents to give their consent. Given the sensitive nature of this information, we take extra measures to make sure that the parent of the child is really the one giving the consent. Under COPPA and GDPR-K, one of the ways to do so is by performing a credit card transaction for a small charge ($1). Here are some of the interesting things we’ve learned while iterating on our parental consent flows: Read More
Why COPPA flags don’t work (and just cost Oath/AOL $5M)
The announcement that Oath has just been hit with the largest fine in the history of COPPA underlines the volume and quality of child-directed inventory being bought and sold within the mainstream (adult) programmatic exchanges. Read More