The Federal Trade Commission announced a $520 million settlement with the developer of popular video games over charges that they illegally collected information from children and tricked millions of players into making purchases.
The deals involve record penalty amounts.
The Children's Online Privacy Protection Act requires a parent's consent to collect personal information from children under the age of 13 who play online games. The agency said in a legal complaint that the company made parents jump through hoops to have their children's data deleted.
The $170 million penalty was the previous record for child privacy violations and was paid by the company.
High-privacy default settings for children and teens will be required by the proposed settlement. Live text and voice chats for younger users must be turned off.
The company agreed to pay $245 million to refunds consumers over accusations that it tricked users of all ages into making purchases. Regulators said in a complaint that the user interface of the game had a counterintuitive, inconsistent and confusing layout.
While the game was loading a screen, players could be charged if they tried to use sleep mode. The children racked up unauthorized charges without their parents knowing. Hundreds of millions of dollars were spent on unwanted charges for users.
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