Amazon’s Efforts to Diversify Its Revenue Land it in Hot Water with Regulators

According to the Federal Trade Commission, “Amazon’s history of misleading parents, keeping children’s recordings indefinitely, and flouting parents’ deletion requests violated COPPA and sacrificed privacy for profits”.

Click to read the referenced article: Amazon to pay over $30 million to settle claims Ring, Alexa invaded user privacy : NPR

So how did “the everything store” get away with a “disregard for #privacy and security that exposed consumers to #spying and harassment” by paying a relatively small $30 million fine while continuing to avoid billions in U.S., European and Canadian taxes?

To be fair, profit shifting and #tax minimization strategies are common in companies of all sizes, but merely a slap on the wrist for violations of children’s #privacy will only embolden invasive #data collection through ‘smart devices’ and enable unscrupulous #edtech “innovators” to further exploit vulnerable sectors.

Claudiu Popa is a book collector, author and the co-founder of the Knowledgeflow Foundation, a nonprofit organization that empowers communities to weaponize digital literacy and critical thinking against disinformation. He is also the CEO of Datarisk Canada, one of the first information security companies focused on the protection of intangible assets.