Epic Games to pay more than $500 million to resolve FTC allegations.
developer Epic Games to pay a record-breaking $520 million over allegations"the company violated the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act and deployed design tricks, known as dark patterns, to dupe millions of players into making unintentional purchases."In a complaint filed in federal court, the FTC alleged that Epic violated COPPA by collecting personal information from children under the age of 13 who played Fortnite without obtaining their parents' consent.
The FTC's second complaint concerned the use of"dark patterns to trick players into making unwanted purchases and let children rack up unauthorised charges without any parental involvement." The complaint says that Fortnite's"counterintuitive, inconsistent, and confusing button configuration" has led its players to receive unwanted charges due to the single-button press nature of the in-game store's purchasable items.
In light of the complaints, the FTC has put forward an administrative order that requires Epic to pay $245 million to FTC for"unlawful billing practices," which will be used to"refund consumers." The company will also be prohibited from using dark patterns to charge users without"affirmative" consent, and barred from blocking consumers from accessing their accounts when disputing unauthorised charges.
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