Social media companies collect, share and process vast amounts of information about their users while providing little transparency and control, including over how artificial intelligence systems use that information, the Federal Trade Commission said in a report released Thursday.
The report analyzed how companies such as Meta Platforms, ByteDance’s TikTok, and Amazon’s gaming platform Twitch manage user data, and concluded that many companies’ data management and retention policies are “woefully inadequate.”
YouTube, which is owned by Alphabet Inc’s Google, social media platform X, Snap, Discord and Reddit were also named in the FTC report, but the report’s findings were anonymous and did not reveal the practices of specific companies.
Communications platform Discord said the report lumped very different business models together and that it was not serving advertising at the time the research was conducted.
An X spokesperson said the report was based on practices from 2020 when the site was still called Twitter, which X has since improved.
“X takes user data privacy very seriously and ensures users understand what data they share with the platform and how that data is used, while providing them with the option to limit the data collected from their accounts,” the spokesperson said.
Currently, only about 1% of X’s U.S. users are between the ages of 13 and 17, the spokesman said.
The other companies did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The FTC said social media companies collect data through tracking technologies used in online advertising, purchasing information from data brokers and other means.
“While these surveillance practices are lucrative for companies, they can compromise people’s privacy, threaten their freedoms, and expose them to a host of harms, including identity theft and stalking,” said FTC Chairwoman Lina Khan.
Data privacy, especially for children and teenagers, has been a hot topic. The U.S. House of Representatives is considering a bill passed by the Senate in July that aims to address the impact of social media on young users. Meta recently launched teen accounts with enhanced parental controls.
It comes as big tech companies scramble to acquire data sources to train their emerging artificial intelligence technologies. These data deals are rarely disclosed and often involve private content locked behind paywalls and login screens with little or no notice to the users who posted it.
In addition to collecting data on how users use their services, most of the companies reviewed by the FTC collect users’ age and gender, or make guesses based on other information. Some also collect information on users’ income, education and family status, the FTC said.
The FTC said some companies collected data on individuals who did not use their services, and some failed to identify all the ways they collected and used data.
Ad industry groups criticized the report on Thursday, saying consumers recognize the value of ad-supported services.
“We are disappointed that the FTC continues to characterize the digital advertising industry as engaging in ‘mass commercial surveillance,’” said David Cohen, CEO of the Interactive Advertising Bureau, an advertising and marketing group that counts Snapchat, TikTok and Amazon among its members.
© Thomson Reuters 2024
(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
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