FTC Files Amicus Brief Saying COPPA Can’t Force Parents Into Arbitration

The Federal Commerce Fee filed an amicus transient in a lawsuit introduced by a gaggle of fogeys who’re suing IXL Studying, Inc. The FTC’s transient disputes the corporate’s argument that below the Youngsters’s On-line Privateness Safety Act and the COPPA Rule, the colleges’ settlement to binding arbitration additionally utilized to folks.

The plaintiffs within the case – Shanahan, et al. v. IXL Studying, Inc. – are mother and father of faculty age kids who allege IXL Studying illegally collected, used and offered their kids’s information on their web site and software program in class. The mother and father’ putative class motion lawsuit alleges that the schooling firm violated varied legal guidelines, together with the Federal Wiretap Act and a number of California statutes, in addition to frequent legislation privateness torts.

IXL Studying, which offers web sites and college instructional providers, filed a movement to compel arbitration, claiming that the varsity districts agreed to the corporate’s full phrases of service, together with an arbitration provision. IXL Studying argued that below COPPA, college districts act as brokers for the mother and father in the usage of IXL’s instructional providers, and the mother and father are due to this fact sure by the total phrases of service.

The FTC amicus transient clarifies that nothing in COPPA or the COPPA Rule dictates that folks and kids must be sure by each a part of the phrases of service settlement between an organization like IXL Studying and a faculty district, nor does COPPA assist a declare that folks must be sure to arbitration on this case.

In December 2023, the Fee proposed amendments to strengthen the COPPA Rule by additional limiting firms’ skill to monetize kids’s information. The proposed Rule would require focused promoting to be off by default, bar indefinite retention of youngsters’ information, and strengthen information safety. The Fee’s overview of this Rule is ongoing.

The company filed its amicus transient in the US District Courtroom for the Northern District of California, San Francisco Division. 

The Fee voted 5-0 to file the amicus transient. Commissioner Andrew Ferguson issued a concurring assertion.