It’s over, Epic Games will have to pay 520 million dollars to the FTC… but why again?

Epic Games has just announced an agreement with the FTC in which the studio will have to pay two significant fines.

Epic Games will thus have to pay a first fine of 245 million dollars, and a second of 275 million with the regulator. Unprecedented amounts.

Epic Games accused of duping customers and failing to protect children’s privacy

This is an important agreement that has just been formalized today. The American video game development studio has indeed been sentenced to two separate fines by the Federal Trade Commission, the American equivalent of the repression of fraud.

The first fine of 245 million euros follows accusations of ” dark practices [destinées] fool millions of players into making unintended payments “. In the same case, Epic Games is also accused of ” letting children rack up unauthorized charges without any parental supervision “.

The question of children is central to this charge since the second fine of 275 million euros, the highest ever imposed for the violation of an FTC rule, concerns minors. Epic Games is indeed guilty of having collected the data of children under the age of 13 playing Fortnite, without the parents giving their consent or even being informed.

Changes are announced

Thus, the FTC announces that in addition to these two fines, representing a cumulative sum of 520 million dollars, Epic Games will have to change its default settings and ” return millions to consumers “.

The regulator also explains that written and voice communications will be prohibited to children under 13, unless they obtain parental consent. Teenagers (or their parents) will also need to give their formal consent in the privacy settings to have access to these options. Finally, any data previously collected in violation of the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act must be deleted.

On the other hand, to comply with the injunctions of the FTC, Epic Games announces that a user will have the choice or not to save his payment information. In addition, the studio will put in place a mechanism to reconfirm the player’s willingness to buy. And, lately, the order also prohibits Epic from blocking consumers from accessing their accounts to dispute unauthorized charges “.

Source : Epic Games, FTC (Twitter)