Lawmakers Want Facebook to Stop Spying on Minors

“Wiretapping teens is not research.”

Facebook was collecting the data of teenagers through an application that avoided Apple review.Jaap Arriens/NurPhoto via ZUMA Press

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

The day after Tech Crunch revealed that Facebook paid minors to monitor their phone usage, lawmakers are demanding that Facebook stop collecting data on teenagers.

“It is inherently manipulative to offer teens money in exchange for their personal information when younger users don’t have a clear understanding how much data they’re handing over and how sensitive it is,” said Sen. Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.), a member of the Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, in a statement. “I strongly urge Facebook to immediately cease its recruitment of teens for its Research Program and explicitly prohibit minors from participating.”

Mark Zuckerberg’s empty promises are not enough,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) said a statement to Mother Jones, demanding the Federal Trade Commission “step up to the plate” and begin an investigation. Blumenthal’s statement said he will “be writing to Apple and Google on Facebook’s egregious behavior, and working in Congress to make sure that teens are protected from Big Tech’s privacy intrusions.”

According to Tuesday’s Tech Crunch report, Facebook had been paying users as young as 13 to install an app from either the Apple App Store or Google Play allowing the company complete access to their phone. In June, Apple informed Facebook that the app violated its data collection policies. Facebook removed the app at the time from the App Store, only to continue the project through a new app that bypassed Apple review due to a distribution loophole that is designed for companies to distribute apps internally to its employees. Following the Tech Crunch report, Apple shut down the new version of the app. As of publication, the app is still available on Android.

While Facebook’s actions are not in violation of the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, which was passed by Congress in 1998 to protect the privacy of children under 13, Markey says that the law should be updated to include the privacy of teenagers. 

In a statement to Tech Crunch, Facebook claimed that “less than 5 percent of the people who chose to participate in this market research program were teens. All of them with signed parental consent forms.” Participants received a payment of $20 a month after installing the app. 

The news came just a day after Markey and Blumenthal sent a letter to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg about an investigation from the Center for Investigative Reporting that showed that Facebook willingly ignored reports of children under 13 using their parents’ credit cards to play games on the platform. The letter also reaffirmed concerns about Facebook’s messenger product, which targets children under 13. The letter asks Facebook to answer when the company and Zuckerberg personally first became aware of the credit card issue and what policy changes the company has taken to address the issue. 

“Wiretapping teens is not research, and it should never be permissible,” said Blumenthal. “Facebook continues to demonstrate its eagerness to look over everyone’s shoulder and watch everything they do in order to make money.”

Update (1/31/19): A Facebook spokesperson emailed comment after this story was published: “Key facts about this market research program are being ignored. Despite early reports, there was nothing ‘secret’ about this; it was literally called the Facebook Research App. It wasn’t ‘spying’ as all of the people who signed up to participate went through a clear on-boarding process asking for their permission and were paid to participate. Finally, less than 5 percent of the people who chose to participate in this market research program were teens. All of them with signed parental consent forms.”

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate