As reported in The New York Times today, the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) expanded the types of companies required to obtain parental permission before knowingly collecting personally identifiable information of children. At issue was the fact that the Children’s Online Protection Privacy Act of 1998 (or “COPPA”) had not identified mobile app developers as a “company” required to obtain parental consent before accumulating personal information of a child. FTC Chairman, Jon Leibowitz, hailed the broadening of the definition of who must comply with COPPA as a “landmark update” to a law that was enacted during the “desktop era.”
