Why youth’s fondness for YouTube puts the company at risk
Survey shows most parents let children use the site despite concerns over targeted ads
A new survey shows YouTube is hugely popular among families with young children. That could be a problem for YouTube.
Amid concern from children’s advocacy groups that the Google-owned video site is profiting from advertisements targeted at minors, the survey from the Pew Research Center shows that more than four out of five parents with children 11 and younger have given them permission to watch a YouTube video. More than one-third of those parents let their children watch videos on the site regularly, according to the results of the survey published on Wednesday.
The survey also showed that the majority of parents whose children watch YouTube say their children have seen disturbing content on the site.
The findings could lend support to a group of consumer rights and children’s privacy advocates that filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission in April, accusing Google of knowingly collecting data from underage YouTube viewers for the purpose of targeting ads. The Children’s Online Privacy Act of 1998 makes it illegal for businesses to collect information from minors under 13 without getting explicit consent from their parents.
In response to the complaint, Google has said it doesn’t allow anyone under 13 to create an account on YouTube, and when it finds children who have violated that policy it kicks them off the site. The company also offers YouTube Kids, child-friendly video app that doesn’t collect data on minors.
“Protecting kids and families has always been a top priority for us,” a YouTube spokeswoman said in a statement. “Because YouTube is not for children, we’ve invested significantly in the creation of the YouTube Kids app to offer an alternative specifically designed for children.”
Pew’s survey questions focused on parents who knowingly give their children permission to watch YouTube. The researcher didn’t specifically ask about the YouTube Kids app. The results were based on a nationally representative survey of more than 4,500 U.S. adults, Pew said.
Even if minors are logging into the app with the knowledge of their parents, YouTube is breaking the law by collecting data such as the geolocation of those