The Federal Trade Commission on Monday issued a new report, "Mobile Apps for Kids: Disclosures Still Not Making the Grade," which found much lacking in the privacy disclosures and practices of apps offered for children in Google and Apple's online stores. This is the second survey of kids' mobile apps by the FTC, following one previous study in 2011.
The FTC's staff "found little progress toward giving parents the information they need to determine what data is being collected from their children, how it is being shared, or who will have access to it," the report states. It also finds that "many of the apps surveyed included interactive features, such as connecting to social media, and sent information from the mobile device to ad networks, analytics companies, or other third parties, without disclosing these practices to parents."
Here's the full report (PDF).
There's an analysis of the report in the New York Times.
Apps for Kids is, of course, also the name of a weekly podcast that our own Mark Frauenfelder hosts with his daughter Jane. There's more of interest for parents in our newly-launched Boing Boing Family section.
