#child-privacy

#child-privacy

Catch up quick: Researchers reported last month that bondu, an AI-powered conversational toy company, inadvertently exposed children's chat transcripts and personal data through a publicly accessible portal. Bondu, which allows parents to check their children's conversations, said it took down the exposed portal and relaunched it the next day with authentication measures, according to Wired. Driving the news: New Hampshire Senator Maggie Hassan, the ranking member of the Senate's Joint Economic Committee, is now asking bondu to explain how the exposure occurred.

In late September, The Guardian reported that Meta used back-to-school photos of teenage girls to advertise the Threads app to fully grown men. Girls as young as 13. These photos were posted by regular moms on Facebook and Instagram, some of whom had their profiles set to private. The photos of girls in their school uniforms appeared in-feed as advertisements resembling organic "suggested" threads posts, or were outright cross-posted without consent. Their faces weren't hidden or blurred.

The criminals began posting profiles of the children to their website last Thursday, adding another 10 children days later and vowing to continue until Kido Schools paid a ransom in Bitcoin. The criminals also contacted parents directly with threatening phone calls whilst trying to get their ransom paid. But public revulsion at their attack appears to have forced the criminals to backtrack.

Hackers who attempted to extort a nursery chain by posting stolen images and data about children on the darknet have removed the posts and claim to have deleted the information. The criminals began posting profiles of the children to their website last Thursday, adding another 10 children days later and vowing to continue until Kido Schools paid a ransom in Bitcoin. The criminals also contacted parents directly with threatening phone calls whilst trying to get their ransom paid.

TikTok's efforts to stop children using the app and protect their personal data have been inadequate, a Canadian investigation has found. Hundreds of thousands of children in the country use TikTok each year despite the firm saying it is not intended for people under the age of 13, according to the findings. The investigation also found TikTok had collected sensitive personal information from "a large number" of Canadian children and used it for online marketing and content targeting.

The Walt Disney Co. has agreed to pay $10 million to settle a Federal Trade Commission inquiry into alleged violations of child privacy laws. The settlement, disclosed Tuesday, covers videos that Disney uploaded to YouTube that were not properly marked as children's content. That lapse allowed the videos to become targets for online advertising, drawing the attention of federal regulators.

The detailed profile typically consists of the child's personal data such as full name, address, date of birth, hobbies, interests and more. And it can lead to cyberbullying, online harassment, identity theft, privacy breaches, contact by a stranger and more, the experts warn. 'Sharenting can seem like a useful way to celebrate special occasions and update family members around the world on children's progress,' said Dr Anita Lavorgna, assistant professor in criminology at the University of Southampton.

I couldn't do it without Naomi. We have a great partnership at home and professionally, so it makes the family juggling act that much easier when we can all be together. We try to keep the kids grounded and away from all of the Hollywood stuff so they can be kids as long as possible,