Amazon has agreed to pay more than $30 million to settle FTC allegations of privacy violations violating privacy laws by holding onto children’s data, according to federal filings.
NPR reports that according to federal filings, Amazon has reached an agreement to pay more than $30 million to resolve claims of privacy violations involving its voice assistant Alexa and doorbell camera Ring.
Amazon introduces Alexa for Kids (Amazon)
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) charged the tech giant with violating privacy laws by holding onto children’s data, including voice and geolocation information, despite parental requests for its deletion. According to reports, this information was used to improve Amazon’s algorithms, which is against the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA).
“Amazon’s history of misleading parents, keeping children’s recordings indefinitely, and flouting parents’ deletion requests violated COPPA and sacrificed privacy for profits,” said Samuel Levine, director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection. “COPPA does not allow companies to keep children’s data forever for any reason, and certainly not to train their algorithms.”
Amazon will pay a $25 million civil fine as part of the settlement and will not be allowed to use data that has been asked to be deleted. Additionally, the business will be required to delete children’s inactive Alexa accounts and notify its clients of the FTC’s actions.
In a separate lawsuit, Amazon was accused of allowing its Ring employees to watch customers’ camera recordings without their permission, resulting in a $5.8 million fine. The FTC claimed that Amazon failed to implement adequate security measures, which allowed for harassment and hacking incidents.
“Ring’s disregard for privacy and security exposed consumers to spying and harassment,” Levine said. “The FTC’s order makes clear that putting profit over privacy doesn’t pay.”
Despite these accusations, Amazon insists that it has always taken precautions to protect customer privacy and has never broken any laws. According to the company, all child profiles must have parental consent, clear privacy disclosures are provided, and child recordings and transcripts can be removed from the Alexa app.
“We take our responsibilities to our customers and their families very seriously,” Amazon said in a statement. “We have consistently taken steps to protect customer privacy by providing clear privacy disclosures and customer controls, conducting ongoing audits and process improvements, and maintaining strict internal controls to protect customer data.”
This agreement represents a turning point in the ongoing discussion about data privacy and the duties of tech companies in protecting user information.
Read more at NPR here.
Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship. Follow him on Twitter @LucasNolan
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