Children's Advocacy Group Withdraws from Facebook Settlement
The Campaign for Commercial-Free Childhood has turned down $290,000 from a controversial consumer privacy settlement concerning Facebook's Sponsored Stories. The children's advocacy group said, "We now believe that this settlement is actually worse than no settlement. It harms vulnerable teenagers and their families under the guise of helping them...we cannot benefit from a settlement which we now realize is harmful to children and will impede future efforts to protect minors' privacy on Facebook." The MacArthur Foundation withdrew from the Fraley settlement last year, suggesting the funds be redirected to "other non-profit organizations engaged in the underlying issues." And in a related case, Chief Justice Roberts suggested that the Supreme Court will need to address "fundamental concerns surrounding the use of such remedies in class action litigation." EPIC has worked closely with consumer privacy organizations and federal courts to improve class action settlements, arguing that settlements in consumer privacy cases should improve consumer privacy and that awards should be allocated to organizations aligned with the interests of class members. For more information, see EPIC: Fraley v. Facebook.
February 20, 2014| Share:
