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Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Apple Urged to Stop Advertising to Minors (bbc.com) 64

Posted by EditorDavid from the underage-ads dept.
The BBC reports: Tech firms have been urged to stop advertising to under-18s in an open letter signed by Members of Parliament, academics and children's-rights advocates. Behavioural advertising not only undermines privacy but puts "susceptible" youngsters under unfair marketing pressure, the letter says. It is addressed to Google, Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Microsoft.

In a separate move Google-owned YouTube is accused of unlawfully mining data from five million under-13s in the UK...

"The fact that ad-tech companies hold 72 million data points on a child by the time they turn 13 shows the extent of disregard for these laws, and the extraordinary surveillance to which children are subjected," the letter reads.
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Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Apple Urged to Stop Advertising to Minors More

Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Apple Urged to Stop Advertising to Minors

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  • Does this mean that children shouldn't be able to watch TV either because there are embedded commercials?

    Collecting data from children less than 13 is wrong but showing untargeted advertisements should still be okay unless you plan on banning advertisements everywhere that a child has access to including ads on the side of the street, on the shelves at the grocery store, and even through the mail because the kid could see it after mom get it inside the house.

    • Re:What about TV (Score:5, Informative)

      by Nidi62 ( 1525137 ) on Monday September 21, 2020 @08:20AM (#60527082)

      Collecting data from children less than 13 is wrong but showing untargeted advertisements should still be okay

      And it is. With TV/billboards/general advertising you can infer some basic things like, for example, show A is geared towards preteen girls so 12 year old Suzy may have watched it. The issue is with things like Youtube, social media, and internet tracking as whole can get much more detailed: 12 year old Suzy watched a youtube video, then watched a video by influencer X on social media site Y, then went and searched for product X which was sponsored content in influencer X's video. They can track how much time is spent on social media, what videos are watched, what they search for, etc. Enough information that they can start targeting more and more specific groups or demographics. And this capability, combined with the malleability of children, leads to a greater likelihood of deception, manipulating, or at the very least priming for later manipulation.

    • Methinks unless its a site specifically designed for kids it would actually be very difficult to provide "untargeted" ads to children. Just being able to determine they were underage and therefore should get ads for kids violates the whole don't collect data on kids thing.

      • Methinks unless its a site specifically designed for kids it would actually be very difficult to provide "untargeted" ads to children. Just being able to determine they were underage and therefore should get ads for kids violates the whole don't collect data on kids thing.

        There's "youtube kids" but the article doesn't mention it so I don't know if there's any distinction there wrt advertising except for bumpers noted on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

        • That's exactly what I was thinking about. That and sites like Disney and Nickelodeon have that are expressly for kids. You have a reasonable expectation that kids are the main demographic there so untargeted ads meant for kids make sense on those sites. But on other sites not so much.

          • That's exactly what I was thinking about. That and sites like Disney and Nickelodeon have that are expressly for kids. You have a reasonable expectation that kids are the main demographic there so untargeted ads meant for kids make sense on those sites. But on other sites not so much.

            Fun fact, my country has rules against ads targeted at kids so to circumvent that some channels are officially broadcasted from the UK who apparently are happy to to host them although afaik they can not be viewed from the UK nor are they broadcasting in english.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by tepples ( 727027 )

              my country has rules against ads targeted at kids

              How do regulators expect children's broadcasters to cover their operating expenses? Does your country allow encrypting broadcast TV to block non-subscribers from viewing? Or does your country impose a tax on TV use the way Britain does to fund the BBC?

              • We have public service and encrypted satellite/cable/terrestrial.

                • Re: (Score:2)

                  by tepples ( 727027 )

                  I don't know what you mean by "public service" in this context.

                  For comparison, the USA has three categories of non-Internet TV:
                  - Public Broadcasting Service (PBS), funded by donations from viewers, donations from institutions, and the government
                  - Commercial free-to-air TV, funded entirely by ads
                  - Encrypted subscription TV (cable and satellite), most of which carries advertising in order to cover operation costs partly from subscriptions and partly from ads

                  Does your country have or lack the commercial free-t

    • Block commercials -- problem solved.

  • But Microsoft and Apple? They aren't in the same league in terms of data slurping and ad slinging.

    Oh well, they are tech companies so Politicians who don't know better will lump them together.

    • Re:Facebook, Google and Amazon I can understand (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Zocalo ( 252965 ) on Monday September 21, 2020 @09:01AM (#60527216) Homepage
      The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist. It's the same with Apple and Microsoft (who owns LinkedIn, lest we forget) and their data capture/advertising efforts. You shouldn't assume that it needs to be a direct relationship between Apple/Microsoft and the company whose product is being advertised either; far more likely Apple and Microsoft are dealing with brokers selling ad-targetting data to them in bulk, who will then provide access to futher middlemen that actually provide the ads (the chart in the linked article [businessinsider.com.au] is from 2013, I'm sure its even more deliberately obfuscated now).

      Do you think all those ads in iPad apps are *not* being targetted based on data gathered by Apple? It might not be so overt to the end-user, and certainly doesn't get the media coverage (viz. the spat with Epic over Fortnight's in-app sales), and they no doubt keep the data closer to their chest, but I have no doubt that Apple have every bit the stranglehold over their advertising partners as they do over the people hoping to sell Apps via their store. Microsoft is prhaps a little harder to pin down, but there are also plenty of ads in their Windows 10 Store apps, and they are well documented has being able to gather a huge amount of browser and telemetry data that can be used by data brokers to help advertisers target their wares.

      They're absolutely in the same league as Amazon, FaceBook, and Google, even if their precise rankings are a little more difficult to pin down.

      • You make it sound like some big conspiracy when Apple is very clear about how they track and how they target.

        Copy and paste from privacy settings...

        Ads that are delivered by Apple’s advertising platform may appear on the AppStore, Apple News, and Stocks. Apple’s advertising platform does not track you, meaning that it does not link user or device data collected from our apps with user or device data collected from third parties for targeted advertising or advertising measurement purposes, and does not share user or device data with data brokers.

        Contextual Information

        Contextual information may be used to serve ads to you, such as:

        Device Information: Your keyboard language settings, device type, OS version, mobile carrier, and connection type.

        Device Location: If Location Services is enabled and you’ve granted permission to the AppStore or Apple News apps to access your location, your location may be used to serve you geographically relevant ads. Your precise device location is not stored by Apple’s advertising platform, and profiles are not constructed from this information. To access these settings, go to Settings > Privacy > Location Services. ...

        And so on ...
        You can turn off the targeting with a simple toggle and get random ads from Apples platform at least. You can also toggle off app tracking from the same Privacy settings area, but apps and sites can always track you via other means if they're clever.

    • But Microsoft and Apple? They aren't in the same league in terms of data slurping and ad slinging.

      You my friend, are extremely naive.

  • Undermining privacy and using millions of data points for behavioral marketing to create unfair marketing pressure is just what people expect from Facebook, Google, Microsoft and Apple.
    • Exactly. If the tech is here to manipulate people into buying your product... Whoever wouldnt use it will get gobbled up by the competition that does.

  • Urging is meaningless. (Score:3)

    by Gravis Zero ( 934156 ) on Monday September 21, 2020 @08:50AM (#60527178)

    Anyone who understands how publicly traded businesses work understands that if there is profit in it, a business will do it. Until they pass a law, exactly nothing will change. After they pass a law, they will comply only as long as the cost of violating the law is higher than the profit gained from violating the law.

    • Oh, are there someone still using Google Hangouts? I thought in 2020 all moved to Zoom. When it comes to work, people want the same ease of collaboration they get in the office or in person -- and in many ways,Zoomdelivers this. Zoom is written in Javaand Swift/Objective-C, you can read here more about other frameworks and how to create a perfect mobile app
  • Certain advertising should not be directed at children, but to ask all advertising to not be directed to children; you might as well go back to the generic, white label label packaging.

    • Re:Not Tenable (Score:4, Interesting)

      by ISayWeOnlyToBePolite ( 721679 ) on Monday September 21, 2020 @09:30AM (#60527308)

      Certain advertising should not be directed at children, but to ask all advertising to not be directed to children; you might as well go back to the generic, white label label packaging.

      Since most goods are bought by adults, having to aim the advertising at them wouldn't be too much of a restriction imho.

  • This BS is why I have to endure 7 minute commercials for business point of sale software during my grand-kids Blippy show on YouTube. At least a 30 second advert for a toy watergun is vaguely relevant to a child.

  • We're fighting almost all corporate (mis)-behaviours, such as those mentioned in the summary, on individual fronts. We're never going to win more than a few minor skirmishes with this emphasis on tactics rather than on strategy. We need to start strategically rolling back corporate power and freedoms.

    Corporations are legally mandated to maximize shareholder profits as their only priority. They are legally prohibited from placing a higher priority on any other factor, including the social good and mental hea

    • Corporations are legally mandated to maximize shareholder profits as their only priority. They are legally prohibited from placing a higher priority on any other factor,

      All pure bullshit. Corporations are legally mandated to follow their charter. If the charter says that the corporation's goal is to maximize shareholder value (or similar) then you're right. If the charter says that its goal is to make sure every child gets a pony free of charge, then it's about ponies and not about profit.

      What's primarily wrong with corporations is that they are essentially automatically granted. You should have to prove public interest in order to form a corp.

      • Corporations are legally mandated to maximize shareholder profits as their only priority. They are legally prohibited from placing a higher priority on any other factor,

        All pure bullshit. Corporations are legally mandated to follow their charter. If the charter says that the corporation's goal is to maximize shareholder value (or similar) then you're right.

        That strikes me as a distinction without a difference, given that a corporation that doesn't adopt maximizing shareholder value as a key point in its charter is unlikely to grow to the size where it can do much damage.

        What's primarily wrong with corporations is that they are essentially automatically granted.

        I would argue that what's primarily wrong with corporations is the concept of corporate personhood. If you can't slap it in the face, make it weep, reason with it, or throw its ass in prison, then it ain't a person and ought not to be treated as one.

        You should have to prove public interest in order to form a corp.

        I agree entirely. But I have to wonder how m

        • There's definitely a lot more to be done than to stop handing out corporations like candy. Not giving corporations special rights would be a good place to start. But then, the whole point of a corporation is to separate profit from responsibility. Arguably, they should not exist at all. Co-ops of co-ops can do everything that corporations do, except produce profit for people with no responsibility.

          • I agree wholeheartedly, but anything that even remotely looks like collectivism draws so much contempt on Slashdot that I've always hesitated to mention it here. Replacing corporations with co-ops may be civilization's last best hope for survival.

  • If you don't want your kid to see ads, then why are you letting them on facebook? How many regulations are we going to burden internet companies with? At this point it's harassment. You will need massive federal bureacracies to watch for these silly things. What will the bureacracy do when it has tackled facebook? Probably find something else to fuck with.

    • If you don't want your kid to see ads, then why are you letting them on facebook? How many regulations are we going to burden internet companies with? At this point it's harassment. You will need massive federal bureacracies to watch for these silly things. What will the bureacracy do when it has tackled facebook? Probably find something else to fuck with.

      It's basically the same as blaming cigarette companies for kids smoking, or the brewing companies for them drinking. Kid's are smoking weed? Must have been a drug pusher.
      We blame everyone else for our problems, and nobody wants to take any personal responsibility. It's kind of a modern "the devil made me do it" thing.

  • If you are like me, you have drilled into them at a young age that commercials are evil, are designed to trick you into thinking you want to give them all your money. My kids now yell at the ads more often than me, so I am slightly less worried. However... I still regret letting my kids have so much access to Youtube. They waste way more time on it than my siblings and I ever did with TV, and that is saying a lot. I drag them off it every chance I get, but it just got a lot harder with them schooling from h

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      The art of advertising is the effort to arrest human intelligence long enough to get money from it.

      Humans have a hard enough time trying to form an independent thought. To employ critical thinking, or even just questioning the motives of the second party's mind. Maybe when you think your little bubble is the whole universe, your existence is all, Look Out For Number One, there is no hope of conceiving of another mind.

      I've sat through enough mandatory cybersecurity trainings to know they basically repeat the

    • Ads can be annoying, but they are not inherently evil. There's nothing wrong with businesses trying to inform the public of their existence, products or services. Would your job exist if your employer wasn't able to communicate with potential customers?

      https://youtu.be/YhrnMbhMgmw?t... [youtu.be]

  • To my knowledge all sorts of advertisement targeting children is forbidden in the Nordic countries. Atleast it was on Tv. Not sure how they handle web. And it pretty much males sence but i doubt the big advertisers like it and always try to find ways around that

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by tepples ( 727027 )

      Are commercial broadcasters in the Nordic countries required to show programming targeting children, as with the E/I mandate in US law? If so, how should they cover the cost of doing so without ads?

  • Growing up I very much enjoyed watching my Saturday morning cartoons knowing that the advertising that was shown in that timeslot was in no way targeted to children. /sarc

    • And the cartoons themselves were not advertising the cartoon themselves nor any actions in the cartoons targeting directly children. And what about the no-smoking, no-drinking, and all the safety advertising directed at children - shouldn't that be banned too?

  • All advertising in content of any kind during content aimed at minors, especially under around 12 years of age, should be banned completely. I don't know why anyone -- aside from corporations selling to children -- is arguing in favor of it, because it seems obvious to me that children don't have buying power and can't make buying decisions (at least not directly, we all know how "powerful" it can be to have a screaming child and be an exhausted parent, but that argues even more in favor of a ban). Adverti

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