Players who were harmed by alleged "dark patterns" and invoicing methods will receive the $245 million in customer reimbursements. Dark patterns are misleading web strategies that persuade people to take actions they did not mean to.
U.S. federal officials announced Monday that the developer of the well-known video game Fortnite will pay $520 million in fines and refunds to resolve complaints about children's privacy and its payment systems that deceived users into making unauthorised purchases.
In two complaints against Epic Games Inc., which has capitalised on Fortnite's success over the past five years to become a video game juggernaut, the Federal Trade Commission has reached settlements.The total amount of the settlement, $520 million, is made up of $245 million in customer refunds and a $275 million fine for the collection of personal data on Fortnite users under the age of 13 without their knowledge or consent. It is the largest fine ever levied for violating an FTC regulation.
FTC Chair Lina Khan said in a statement that "Epic employed privacy-invasive default settings and deceptive interfaces that deceived Fortnite users, especially teenagers and minors."
In two complaints against Epic Games Inc., which has capitalised on Fortnite's success over the past five years to become a video game juggernaut, the Federal Trade Commission has reached settlements.
The total amount of the settlement, $520 million, is made up of $245 million in customer refunds and a $275 million fine for the collection of personal data on Fortnite users under the age of 13 without their knowledge or consent. It is the largest fine ever levied for violating an FTC regulation.
FTC Chair Lina Khan said in a statement that "Epic employed privacy-invasive default settings and deceptive interfaces that deceived Fortnite users, especially teenagers and minors."
Players who were harmed by alleged "dark patterns" and invoicing methods will receive the $245 million in customer reimbursements. Dark patterns are misleading web strategies that persuade people to take actions they did not mean to.
The FTC claimed that in this instance, "Fortnite's illogical, inconsistent, and confusing button arrangement led gamers to incur unnecessary charges based on the press of a single button."
Players might incur charges, for instance, while attempting to start the game from sleep mode, while it was loading, or by tapping a nearby button while merely attempting to preview an item, the statement added.According to the FTC, "these strategies resulted in hundreds of millions of dollars in unauthorised charges for consumers."
Because it wants "to remain at the forefront of consumer protection and provide the best experience for our players," according to Epic, it agreed to the FTC settlement.No developer makes a game with the purpose of it appearing here, according to Epic.In an effort to lower the barriers defending the iPhone app store, which over the past 14 years has grown to become one of the largest e-commerce centres in the world, Epic has also been engaged in a high-profile legal battle with Apple over the past two years. After Epic changed the Fortnite game's payment method in August 2020, Apple removed the video from the app store, which led to a lawsuit that was tried in court last year.
In part because she agreed with the iPhone maker's argument that its exclusive control of the app store helped safeguard the security and privacy of customers, a federal judge rendered a decision mainly in Apple's favour. A decision on the appeal of the judgement is anticipated early in the following year.
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