Parents In US Offered Refunds For Purchases Kids Made In Fortnite (bbc.com) 29
Parents in the U.S. whose children purchased items in the popular game Fortnite without their permission will be able to claim a refund from today. The BBC reports: The U.S. regulator accused the game of tricking players into making unintended purchases and breaching privacy. Fortnite developer Epic Games agreed to pay $245 million in refunds in 2022. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has now begun the process of contacting 37 million people to alert them to the compensation.
The FTC said Epic Games duped players with "deceptive interfaces" that could trigger purchases while the game loaded, and accused it of having default settings that breached people's privacy. In total, it agreed to a settlement of $520 million with Epic Games over the concerns. This includes a $275 million fine relating to how Fortnite collects data on its users, including those aged under 13, without informing parents. It is the largest fine ever levied by the FTC for breaking a rule. The rest of the settlement will be paid out as refunds.
The FTC said Epic Games duped players with "deceptive interfaces" that could trigger purchases while the game loaded, and accused it of having default settings that breached people's privacy. In total, it agreed to a settlement of $520 million with Epic Games over the concerns. This includes a $275 million fine relating to how Fortnite collects data on its users, including those aged under 13, without informing parents. It is the largest fine ever levied by the FTC for breaking a rule. The rest of the settlement will be paid out as refunds.
Bit harsh (Score:4, Insightful)
The scummy tactics are one thing and I'm glad they're getting a kick in the nuts for it. What I don't get is how they're responsible for little Timmy Shithead stealing mum's credit card. Parents should just be happy he wasted it on virtual junk rather than hookers, blow and a pet tiger.
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Pet tigers are illegal (at least in some states)
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Only in the states where they want their kids to not go to the school for special children for having an odd number of limbs.
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Pet tigers are illegal (at least in some states)
But hookers and blow aren't? Can we at least play blackjack?
Why they're responsible (Score:5, Informative)
They're responsible mainly for the same reason the tobacco companies ended up being held responsible - both worked hard at making their product more addictive, targeting it at vulnerable people(children), and more.
These companies (Apple, Google, and more) deliberately hired psychologists to help engineer their systems to maximize purchases.
I'm a bit more familiar with the Apple and Google cases, but they did things like allow additional transactions without confirmation for an extended period after an authorized purchase. So the kid might not have needed to "steal" the credit card, just go back into the shop and buy more after a parent bought something for the kid as a treat. Next thing you know, the parents are down several hundred.
You also had things like single-click purchase options where it was really easy to make that click. The click popping up and moving another button to take it's space, for example. Or think of things like closing a lot of ads - great big "I wanna visit the ad site!" that is used like 1% of the time deliberately, and the 99% intended tiny "x" close button.
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Wait, you're using the YouTube app?
Who does that?
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Who does that?
Normal users, that's who. Kind of like how most people never change their default search browser, it's a stretch to get them to download an alternate browser, etc...
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Not sure what the fuck your point is here when little Timmy Shithead would have happily spent mum's money if they would have been offered hookers and blow.
Regarding tigers, I'll refer you to the fact that more tigers live in captivity than in the wild thanks to grown-ass kids thinking they need it.
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*gnashing and graphic whinging* !!!
Just wanted to take part in the easy fun for a bit.
Parents apparently gave these kids a credit card.
It was likely saved for future purchases for "convenience".
It turned out pretty convenient for lil' Timmay to use over and over to buy fuckloads of digital swag.
Parents mad now, yet lil' Timmay plays on.
Definitely Fortnite at fault. Timmay and parent are absolved of all responsibility.
Hurray.
Seriously, who the hell plugs a live CC PAN into your kid's game and doesn't expect
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What I don't get is how they're responsible for little Timmy Shithead stealing mum's credit card. Parents should just be happy he wasted it on virtual junk rather than hookers, blow and a pet tiger.
Because that's what they agreed to do as it was a settlement.
I think the more interesting part is why child purchases without the parents knowledge is only refundable from jan 2017 to nov 2018 while any in-game purchase that wasn't wanted is refundable from the same starting point but extending to sep 2022? But then a deal's a deal and without fully knowing every circumstance it's hard to judge the details.
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I'd presume whatever interface caused kids to go nuts on in-app purchases without parent consent was active in that time range and thats a separate thing to whatever the refundable purchase refund is about (Presumably some consumer law that guarantees a refund for unwanted things? Here in australia your guaranteed a refund under law for anything that does not meet reasonable expectations ["not fit for purpose"], which is what got Steam in trouble with them for only offering refunds for 2 hours instead of li
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Bit harsh? Kick in the nuts? This is barely over half of a single year's revenue. Fortnite was released 6 years ago. They got fined ~8.5% of their revenue since fortnite was released.
That's less than most of us pay in income taxes. This wasn't a punishment, it was a business expense. You want to punish them? Calculate the total revenue gained from these actions and seize that much in value from the company as well as a portion of their stock and send all the executives involved to jail.
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That's one interesting number of "rather than" associations :-)
Market to underage kids and you deserve this (Score:2)
What I don't get is how they're responsible for little Timmy Shithead stealing mum's credit card. Parents should just be happy he wasted it on virtual junk rather than hookers, blow and a pet tiger.
Spoken like someone who either isn't a parent or deferred nearly all of the parenting to your spouse. For parents, it's a constant onslaught and I am going through this right now. My kids are constantly asking for inappropriate things...and I tell them no and stand my ground, then they're advertised to mercilessly. For example Fortnite add-ons. My kids want to play fortnite and they're too young & it's forbidden...so they do the same thing you did as a kid...they go to their friend's house and play
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Lots of them (Score:1)
...would prefer refunds for kids.
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So you want your jizz back?
That would be hard to swallow after all those years. Eww.
This is clearly one to share with my students (Score:2)
This got me thinking, it would be nice if Slashdot had an "education," tag.