Megan Limb

Comm 1500

Karl Haase

12/12/19

Current Events Regarding YouTube and COPPA Regulation

Introduction

Children today are constantly bombarded by the media. Whether it be on a tv screen, on a

computer, in a magazine at school, or on their parent’s phone. With an increase in availability to

a younger and younger audience, the parents of these children are faced with a plethora of

options for entertaining and educating their children in an increasingly digital society. With all

these options, parents can’t be completely sure what media their child is consuming and how that

media is influencing them. Enter YouTube, a platform for uploading video content to the web

that is accessible to the masses. From children’s cartoons to fun characters to toy reviews to

slime, YouTube has all the content that a child could dream of, free with a few short ads per

video. In the eyes of parents, YouTube looks like a perfect platform: free, filled with so much

content, shorter videos in case bedtime is soon, and way less ads than television. Of course, there

are some drawbacks to this seemingly perfect platform. First, the ads that YouTube does have

are defined as “targeted ads” this means that YouTube monitors the content that a user watches

and chooses ads that would appeal to the people who watch those videos. That seems all well and

good, until you realize that data-farming the information of children is pretty sketchy. Shouldn’t

there be some kind of law that says you can’t collect data from kids? Well there is, and that law

is called COPPA.
History of Coppa

COPPA is the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Rule. This regulation was passed in

1998 in order to, “prohibit unfair deceptive acts or practices in connection with the collection,

use, and/or disclosure of personal information from and about children on the internet” (ftc.gov).

This regulation was created in order to ensure the protection of kids who use the internet.

COPPA prevents internet creators to mine the information of children.

Under COPPA, in order for a website to collect the information from children who are

using the internet, that operator must obtain parental consent (ftc.gov). That parental consent

may be obtained through several means. First a consent form that is mailed in; second, the parent

can attach a credit card to any purchases; third a parent can call a toll-free phone number; fourth,

the parent can talk with personnel via videoconference; fifth, the operator can verify a parents’

identity via government-issued identification (ftc.gov).

COPPA gives direction in order to determine what can be considered directed to children.

The Federal Trade Commission, “will consider its subject matter, visual content, use of animated

characters or child-oriented activities and incentives, music or other audio content, age of

models, presence of child celebrities or celebrities who appeal to children, language or other

characteristics of the Web site or online service, as well as whether advertising promoting or

appearing on the Web site or online service is directed to children” (ftc.gov). This long list is a

catch-all for anything that a website might contain, and without any specifics as to what is

considered directed at children. Basically, that is considered as ‘for children’ is completely up to

the FTC and subject to change depending on what the commission defines as appealing to

children or uses language that is directed toward children.

COPPA vs. YouTube

In recent history, COPPA and YouTube have created a dialogue discussing what

regulation will be enforced in order to comply with the law. COPPA filed a lawsuit against

YouTube because they were collecting information from children who were using the platform

without sending in proper parental consent (yt channel owners ftc). In order to solve this case,

YouTube and Google are collaborating to create a mechanism to determine what videos that are

uploaded on the site are directed to children. This seeks to ensure that YouTube complies with

the law. YouTube and Google paid a fine of $170 million to the FTC because of their violation

to the COPPA law. Additionally, the COPPA rule allows for “civil penalties of up to $42,530 per

violation, but the FTC considers a number of factors in determining the appropriate amount,

including a company’s financial condition and the impact a penalty could have on its ability to

stay in business” (yt channel owners ftc). That’s a fine that can be placed on every single video

that is determined to not be COPPA compliant, despite it being marked as not made for children.

The YouTube Support page also has something to say to creators of YouTube videos to

prepare for when these fines will start to be enforced. Starting January 2020, creators will have to

mark all of their videos as for kids or not for kids, regardless of when the videos were uploaded.

YouTube has stated that they will use machine learning in order to determine what videos are

directed to kids (Upcoming changes). After all, with over 500 hours of content uploaded every

minute, it would be unrealistic to hire personnel to look through all the content and determine

what videos are or are not targeted towards children (Clement).

YouTube Creators’ Perspective

What do YouTube creators have to say about the regulation that is facing their channels?

After all, they are the ones who will be greatly financially affected by the decisions of these
lawmakers. According to the game theorists, it makes sense to not get too personal when

advertising to children. At the same time though, in today’s society it doesn’t make sense to

force parents to jump through the hoops that COPPA presents in order to provide proper parental

consent. No one is going to fax in a signature. Earlier this year, when Matthew Patrick (the

creator of the Game Theorists) was interviewing the CEO of YouTube, Susan Wojiciki, she said

that she is “trying to explain YouTube to lawmakers who literally don’t own a cell phone” (The

Game Theorists). This can make it incredibly difficult to explain YouTube as a platform and

even harder to discuss how it can and should be regulated. This platform was originally created

as a PG-13 platform, in the terms and conditions of signing up for an account, you agree that you

are 13+ in order to use the website. Unfortunately, one of the reasons that YouTube is only

coming under fire now is because they have been quoted multiple times saying that kids love the

YouTube main platform, and that it’s good for advertisers to advertise to kids on this platform.

That’s why COPPA laws are being called into question now instead of years ago when YouTube

was created. The fees that COPPA is threatening could definitely ruin the lives of content

creators on the platform, after all, 80-90% of a creator’s revenue comes from targeted ads (The

Game Theorists). You can’t just take that away from them so suddenly or expect them to pay 42

thousand dollars per kid friendly video that remains monetized.

In order to avoid the big fine, you could simply mark the video as targeted for kids, but

what happens when a creator does so? First, the video won’t have any notifications or comments.

The video will not be searchable or recommended to watch, and the video will make 90% less

revenue (chadtronic). This will result in creating content that is targeted for kids pointless in the

eyes of content creators who want to receive any money for a video or creators who want anyone

to be able to find their video. Any video that is marked as for kids or not for kids will be
reviewed by the Federal Trade Commission, and their third-party determination could subject the

creators of these videos to enormous fines. This is not some sort of self-policing where YouTube

is trusting that a video will be directed for or not for kids. The FTC will decide, regardless of

what audience you intended the video for (Chadtronic).

Hours of Video uploaded to YouTube every minute as of may 2019

Source: Clement
Works Cited

Business Blog. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/blogs/business-

blog/2019/11/youtube-channel-owners-your-content-directed-children].

Chadtronic. (2019, November 18). Marking "Not For Kids" Doesn't Protect You - COPPA

Update. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0veLrwd9CK4.

Clement, J. (2019, August 9). YouTube: hours of video uploaded every minute 2019. Retrieved

from https://www.statista.com/statistics/259477/hours-of-video-uploaded-to-youtube-

every-minute/.

Federal Trade Commission. (2018, October 4). Children's Online Privacy Protection Rule

("COPPA"). Retrieved from https://www.ftc.gov/enforcement/rules/rulemaking-

regulatory-reform-proceedings/childrens-online-privacy-protection-rule.

The Game Theorists. (2019, November 22). Retrieved December 12, 2019, from

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pd604xskDmU.

Upcoming changes to kids content on YouTube.com - YouTube Help. (n.d.). Retrieved

December 12, 2019, from https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/9383587?hl=en.