Scathing FTC Report Says Social Media Companies Engage in ‘Vast Surveillance’

A report from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has found that major social media and video streaming have been engaged in ‘vast surveillance,’ including of children.

The FTC published a report today of an ongoing study of social media sites from the past four years. According to the findings, many social media sites and streaming services have been involved in “vast surveillance” of customers to profit from personal information. The report names Amazon, Facebook, YouTube, Twitter/X, Snapchat, ByteDance (the company that owns TikTok), and more.

According to the report, spotted by Engadget, these companies “indefinitely retain troves” of the data provided by users, and are found to have “woefully inadequate” security measures in place. Additionally, the FTC staff reported that “some companies did not delete all user data in response to deletion requests.”

Probably the most troubling news from this report is that the social media sites and streamers listed didn’t “adequately protect children and teens on their sites.” While some companies suggested that there are no children on their sites, the data in the report shows that most social media platforms “treated teens the same as adult users,” often not imposing account restrictions. This is a similar conclusion to a Wall Street Journal report from earlier this year that found Instagram’s content algorithms are serving sexual content to kids and teenagers. The report alleges that social media companies may claim children aren’t using their services to avoid liability under existing child privacy protection regulations.

The FTC says the core of the issue here is that the business model of most of these platforms hinges on the “mass collection” of user data to implement revenue-generating targeted advertising. The report describes social media and video streaming companies as having constructed “the infrastructure for mass commercial surveillance,” which the FTC says creates “serious costs to our privacy.”

“The report lays out how social media and video streaming companies harvest an enormous amount of Americans’ personal data and monetize it to the tune of billions of dollars a year,” says FTC Chair Lina M. Khan. “While lucrative for the companies, these surveillance practices can endanger people’s privacy, threaten their freedoms, and expose them to a host of harms, from identify theft to stalking. Several firms’ failure to adequately protect kids and teens online is especially troubling. The Report’s findings are timely, particularly as state and federal policymakers consider legislation to protect people from abusive data practices.”

The study concludes that attempts by these companies to self-regulate “has been a failure.” The FTC report is pessimistic that social media companies will adequately protect their users, provided that strict laws with regulatory teeth are not in effect.

The commission recommends that Congress pass privacy legislation and limit social media platforms’ ability to share information with data collection third parties. Additionally, the report also urges social media platforms to actually delete information when requests are made, as well as limiting the use of ad tracking technology.

This is a troubling yet unsurprising conclusion that many social media users are likely already aware of. As AI systems are further implemented into daily online platforms, the protection of users personal data, especially that of children, is vital. The lengthy, detailed report is available in full on the FTC’s website.

Image credits: Header photo licensed via Depositphotos.