Will Kids’ Privacy Crackdown Break the Internet? Watch the 1/13 event

Roughly a million people have urged the Federal Trade Commission to rethink its approach to children’s privacy. Join TechFreedom on January 13, 2020 in Washington, DC. FTC Commissioner Noah Philips will keynote a luncheon discussion of the most controversial proceeding in the history of the FTC — at least since the late 1970s

Then as now, the FTC has raised public ire by clamping down on advertising to children in ways that supersede parents, rather than empowering them. Over 850,000 people signed an online petition urging the FTC to reconsider its recent settlement with YouTube, which requires even the smallest independent video creators to start determining whether their content is “directed to” children — and requires YouTube to police those decisions automatically. YouTube will sharply restrict functionality for such videos and cease allowing the display of advertising targeted to viewers’ likely interests. These changes are estimated to cost content creators up to 90% of their revenues. Another 175,000 people filed comments in the FTC’s re-examination of the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) Rule, last updated in 2013 — with the vast majority urging the FTC not to choke off the production of free quality video content online. 

RSVP HERE

The event will proceed as follows:

  • Registration and open lunch buffet (11:30-12)
  • Panel 1: YouTube Creators (12:00-45)
    • Ashkhen Kazaryan, Director of Civil Liberties, TechFreedom (moderator)
    • Harry Jho, Sockeye Media, Mother Goose Club (6 million subscribers, 13 billion YouTube views) 
    • Jackie A “NerdECrafter(983k subscribers, COPPA video got 412k views) 
    • Jeremy Johnston, J House Vlogs (2 million subscribers, 2 billion views)   
    • Forrest “Kreekcraft (875k subscribers, COPPA videos getting hundreds of thousands of views) 
  • Panel 2: COPPA Experts (12:45-1:35)
    • Berin Szoka, President, TechFreedom (moderator)
    • Angela Campbell, Professor of Law and Co-Director of the Institute for Public Representation
    • Jim Dunstan, General Counsel, TechFreedom
    • Sarah Holland, Public Policy Manager for Google
    • Phyllis Marcus, Partner, Hunton Andrews Kurth
    • Amelia Vance, Senior Counsel, Future of Privacy Forum
  • FTC Commissioner Phillips, a “fireside chat” with TechFreedom President Berin Szóka  (1:35-2:00)

Read Commissioner Phillips’s remarks on COPPA at the FTC’s October 7 workshop here, and TechFreedom’s recent comments on COPPA here

Logistics

  • Date: January 13, 2020
  • Timing:  12-2 p.m. (lunch 11:30-12)

Location: U.S. Capitol Visitor’s Center, SVC 209-08

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We can be reached for comment at media@techfreedom.org. See our previous comments on this subject: