Child apps, personal data regulation and home-country compliance

Grazia Cecere (), Fabrice Le Guel (), Vincent Lefrere (), Catherine Tucker () and Pai-Ling Yin
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Grazia Cecere: IMT-BS - DEFI - Département Droit, Économie et Finances - TEM - Télécom Ecole de Management - IMT - Institut Mines-Télécom [Paris] - IMT-BS - Institut Mines-Télécom Business School - IMT - Institut Mines-Télécom [Paris], LITEM - Laboratoire en Innovation, Technologies, Economie et Management (EA 7363) - UEVE - Université d'Évry-Val-d'Essonne - IMT-BS - Institut Mines-Télécom Business School - IMT - Institut Mines-Télécom [Paris], RITM - Réseaux Innovation Territoires et Mondialisation - UP11 - Université Paris-Sud - Paris 11
Fabrice Le Guel: RITM - Réseaux Innovation Territoires et Mondialisation - UP11 - Université Paris-Sud - Paris 11
Vincent Lefrere: RITM - Réseaux Innovation Territoires et Mondialisation - UP11 - Université Paris-Sud - Paris 11
Catherine Tucker: MIT Sloan - Sloan School of Management - MIT - Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Pai-Ling Yin: USC Marshall School of Business - USC - University of Southern California

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Abstract: This article uses an original dataset on apps targeted at very young children to explore the types and scope of data that is collected about children when they use online mobile applications. We show that in the global economy of app developers, the geographical location of the developer influences whether they collect sensitive data, such as precise location, about their child users. Developers based in the US or in the OECD are less likely to collect sensitive data, while developers in countries that have no privacy law are most likely to collect sensitive data. We also distinguish the effects of an official Google program which encourages developers to comply with US child privacy regulation. We find that 10% of apps that are targeted at children under 5 that certify themselves via the program collect sensitive data from their child users. By contrast, 47% of apps which are targeted at children under 5 through keywords such as ‘toddler' or ‘preschool' which do not self-certify collect sensitive data about their users.

Date: 2018-06-21
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Published in 16th ZEW Conference on the Economics of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT), Jun 2018, Mannheim, Germany

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hal:journl:hal-02335706

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