YouTube has been accused of violating UK and EU data protection laws by unlawfully collecting data from millions of children without parental consent. The allegations were made in a complaint by a group of privacy advocates, including the London-based NGO the International Institute of Digital Rights, filed with the UK Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) and the Irish Data Protection Commission. The complaint states that Google, which owns YouTube, breached the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the UK’s Data Protection Act by processing children’s personal data and targeting them with ads. It also argues that the company failed to obtain valid consent from parents and failed to implement “effective age-verification mechanisms”. The data allegedly collected includes location, search history, IP address and device information. The complaint is backed by analysis by the privacy consulting firm Brave, which found that Google’s adtech collects data on a child’s location, device and other identifying information every time a child watches a video on YouTube. The complaint also cites YouTube’s use of machine learning algorithms that allow it to automatically identify and categorise children’s content. The algorithms allegedly enable the platform to target children with personalised ads. The complaint comes two years after a similar complaint was filed against Google and YouTube by US advocacy groups. In response to the US case, Google and YouTube paid a settlement of $170m, and agreed to establish a system to identify and restrict targeted ads to children.
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