UK campaign group The Good Law Project has accused Apple and Google of allowing ‘fake age ratings’ on the app stores – and says King, Supercell and many more have been deliberately providing them.
The group has launched a new campaign accusing platform holders Apple and Google of deceiving players by allowing game-makers to display one age rating at the point of download, but hiding the ‘real’ age rating in their games’ service agreements.
Game-makers specifically accused of the practice by the Good Law Project include King, Supercell, Century Games, Kooapps, Toca Boca and SayGames. But there are “thousands and thousands” more, says the group, which is also working with child safety NGO 5Rights to shed light on the issue.
In particular, the campaign focuses on King’s Candy Crush Saga. The Good Law Project claims that King deceives players by showing a 4+ rating on the app stores, but a peek into the game’s service agreement actually requires players to be 13 or over to view the ads served in the game.
The Good Law Project also namechecks Whiteout Survival, Clash of Clans, Pop Us!, Snake.io and Toca Boca World as supposedly having deceptive age ratings.
“Candy Crush isn’t the only app playing this game,” says The Good Law Project. “Thousands and thousands of apps are declaring one age range across the top and hiding another in the terms and conditions.”
“And it’s all to make money out of tricking kids,” the group continues. “Firms can’t build up profiles and dish out surveillance ads to children under 13 without explicit consent from their parents – it’s illegal. But the firms think they’ve covered their backs if the small print that nobody ever reads says users have to be “at least 13″, whatever it says at the top of the page.”
“So young kids are playing apps that bombard them with ads aimed at much older kids. And app developers and app stores are complicit.”
As a result of its findings, The Good Law Project filed an official complaint to the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority yesterday. The complaint claims that the behaviour is unlawful and in breach of UK consumer protection and data processing regulations.
It also claims that Apple and Google have a “special responsibility to protect consumers’ interests” due to their “effective monopoly” on app stores. Apple and Google’s lack of oversight “constitute abuses of their respective dominant positions,” it says.
Apple sent us the following statement in response to the Good Law Project’s claims: “We are committed to protecting user privacy and security and providing a safe experience for children. We do this by giving parents and developers important tools to help protect children on the App Store and across the apps they use.”
“When parents or guardians create an Apple Account for a child under 13 years of age, tracking permissions are disabled by default – so apps can’t request to track them through App Tracking Transparency. These protections are based on the user’s age, not the app. We also require developers to provide clear age ratings consistent with App Store policies, and in instances where an app’s age rating does not match its content, we take immediate action to ensure the issue is corrected.”
We also asked King, Google and Supercell for comment on this story, and will update this article with their remarks if or when they provide them.
At the time of writing, over 6,800 people have added their name to The Good Law Project’s petition to force Google and Apple to make their app stores safer for children.
