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Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton He filed a lawsuit against the streaming service NetflixClaiming that the company collects data from users and children without their consent, which makes the platform addictive.
The complaint alleges that Netflix built “behavioral surveillance software on a staggering scale” that “requires Texas residents and their children to be glued to a screen and then extract every possible piece of data about them.”
The lawsuit alleges that Netflix plans to “monetize the data to make a tidy profit,” though Netflix has denied that it sells its data to third parties, including in the complaint. The document quotes Netflix CEO Reed Hastings on a January 2020 earnings call, in which he said the company was different from competitors like Amazon and Meta.
“We don’t merge everyone’s data,” Hastings said, according to the complaint. “We’re not controversial that way.”
Netflix is The most popular streaming serviceIts main revenue source was primarily subscription-based, although it added Levels of sponsored ads in 2022. the Company subscriptions They currently range from streaming with ads for $9 to the premium version with Dolby Atmos and 4K for $27.
Netflix has been through the courts over privacy concerns before: The company He paid $9 million to settle a lawsuit Alleging that it shared user data back in 2011, although it denied any wrongdoing.
Meanwhile, in 2022, Texas AG settled with Google After claiming that it collected user biometric data without explicit consent, through services such as Google Photos, Google Assistant and Nest Hub Max.
In March, it was Google and Meta Found liable in lawsuit It was filed by a 20-year-old woman who claimed that YouTube and Instagram were designed for this purpose Addiction for childrenThis paves the way for the possibility of other platforms and streaming services being held responsible for addiction.
Netflix did not immediately respond to a request for comment.