Page 24 - ARUBA TODAY

A24 TECHNOLOGY
Friday 14 September 2018
New Mexico sues mobile app makers over kid privacy concerns

By SUSAN MONTOYA BRY- eral law.
AN The company said it is "con-
Associated Press stantly working to improve
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) the program."
— New Mexico is suing Twitter said Tiny Lab was
Google, Twitter and other suspended from its MoPub
companies that develop platform a year ago for
and market mobile gaming violating policies regarding
apps for children, saying child-directed apps. That
the apps violate state and privacy policy does not
federal laws by collecting permit MoPub Services to
personal information that be used to collect informa-
could compromise privacy. tion from apps directed to
The lawsuit filed in federal children under the age of
court late Tuesday comes 13 for purposes of personal-
as data-sharing concerns ized advertising.
persist among users. On its website, Tiny Lab
Social media giant Face- posted that the company is
book just weeks ago pulled not violating federal priva-
one of its own apps over In this Jan. 29, 2015 file photo, New Mexico Attorney General Hector Balderas talks during a news cy laws regarding children
possible privacy intrusions conference in Albuquerque, N.M. since it asks for the birth
and a recent Associated Associated Press date of the user to deter-
Press investigation revealed mine their age according
that several Google apps cation even if users have New Mexico Attorney Gen- he's concerned given that to federal guidelines.
and websites store user lo- turned off location history. eral Hector Balderas said the apps can track with If a user is under 13, none
such precision where chil- of the personal information
Leaked video: Google execs dren live, play and go to is collected, it says. But the
school.
lawsuit argues that's not
bemoan Trump election in 2016 "These multi-million-dollar enough.
Tech companies are un-
tech companies partner-
ing with app developers der increasing scrutiny over
are taking advantage of their data practices, follow-
By The Associated Press New Mexican children, ing a series of privacy scan-
A recently leaked video and the unacceptable risk dals at Facebook and new
from 2016 shows Google of data breach and access data-privacy rules recently
executives lamenting the from third parties who seek adopted by the European
election of Donald Trump, to exploit and harm our Union.
who has accused the children will not be tolerat- Last year, the business
company of doctoring ed in New Mexico," he said. news site Quartz found that
search results for his name. The lawsuit accuses ad- Google was tracking An-
The video , posted on the vertising businesses run by droid users by collecting
Breitbart website, shows Google, Twitter and three the addresses of nearby
Google co-founder Ser- other companies, along cellphone towers even if all
gey Brin saying that the el- with the app maker Tiny location services were off.
evation of Trump was not Lab Productions, of violat- Google changed the prac-
consistent with what the ing a law meant to keep tice and insisted it never re-
company stands for. Dur- private the personal data corded the data anyway.
ing what was clearly an of children under 13. Critics have said Google's
emotional and compa- In this March 12, 2016, file photo Google co-founder Sergey Brin The Children's Online Priva- insistence on tracking its
speaks during a press conference after finishing the third match
nywide meeting, Google of the Google DeepMind Challenge Match in Seoul, South Ko- cy Protection Act adopted users stems from its drive to
executives also extolled rea. by Congress requires web- boost advertising revenue.
democratic values. Associated Press sites and online services to It can charge advertisers
Breitbart says the video disclose what information more if they want to nar-
was provided by an anon- and we design them with news is BAD." they collect from children row ad delivery to people
ymous source. extraordinary care to be Google, based in Moun- and how they use that in- who've visited certain loca-
Google said Thursday in a a trustworthy source of in- tain View, California, has formation. tions.
prepared statement that formation for everyone, consistently denied any That disclosure must also According to the lawsuit,
some workers and execu- without regard to political political bias or consider- be provided directly to par- Google was notified ear-
tives expressed their own viewpoint," the company ation in developing the al- ents and verified consent lier this year by security re-
personal views at the 2016 said. gorithms it uses for internet must be given. The lawsuit searchers at the University
meeting - which is what At the meeting, executives searches. accuses the defendants of California-Berkeley that
has occurred at the regu- talked about a rising xeno- Republicans and conser- of violating these federal they had identified priva-
larly scheduled meetings phobia and nationalism at vative groups have al- mandates. cy-invasive technology
for more than 20 years. home and abroad. Some leged that there is a lib- Google said in a statement and practices in Tiny Lab's
"Nothing was said at that appeared near tears eral bias in Silicon Valley Wednesday that apps in- gaming apps.
meeting, or any other when they spoke about and that companies such cluded in its family program Google responded to the
meeting, to suggest that the U.S. election. as Google, Facebook must comply with stringent researchers, saying that the
any political bias ever in- Last month Trump accused and Twitter actively work policies that address age- apps were not designed
fluences the way we build Google Inc. and other U.S. to suppress conservative appropriate ads and pri- primarily for children, but
or operate our products. tech companies of rigging views. The video fueled vacy disclosures. The com- for families in general so
To the contrary, our prod- search results about him that narrative across social pany also said those apps there were no violations of
ucts are built for everyone, "so that almost all stories & media.q must comply with the fed- the federal privacy laws.q