Apple's attempts to limit data sharing on children's apps have a negative impact on PBS



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Apple's recent change to apps for children in its App Store has a negative impact on the public broadcasting service, and the general manager of the non-profit broadcaster is not happy with it.

Paula Kerger, president and CEO of PBS, told Recode's Peter Kafka on Tuesday at the code conference in Scottsdale, Arizona, that PBS Kids' new streaming apps would be affected by the new restrictions. for kids.

Earlier this month, Apple had announced that it would amend its guidelines and prohibit apps for kids to include third-party advertising and analytics software. It will also be prohibited for children's applications to transmit the data collected in the application to third parties. The changes, which should come into effect on September 3, would prevent PBS from knowing whether its content and gaming features are working, and it would be harder for the user to change apps to make them more effective. tools.

"We will have to remove apps and millions of kids are using our apps. So it's a challenge, "said Kerger. She later added, "We do not sell products to children." Apple has not responded to a request for comment.

Apple's treatment of third-party apps for kids has been under scrutiny in recent months. In April, the New York Times reported that Apple was removing and limiting apps designed to help users reduce screen time or help parents monitor and limit their children's activities on their devices. . The developers of these apps claimed that after the tech giant had announced his own parental control features, he was now trying to crush his competitors.

Apple originally stated that restricted parental control applications gave third parties control and allowed them to access the confidential information of the users of the application. The company subsequently seemed to move away from this position, but reiterated that developers could not "sell, use or disclose to third parties any data for any purpose".

As Sean Hollister of The Verge pointed out, it is not clear if the repression is actually over.

For PBS, the problem has not been solved. "The message in all of this is, look, we love working with all these platforms, it gives us incredible reach," said Kerger. "Speak to us, sit down and speak to us.

Yamiche Alcindor, PBS NewsHour correspondent at the White House, appeared alongside Kerger at Code on Tuesday and said that the programming broadcast by the network could really push users to its applications and, consequently, to different platforms and technology companies , especially Apple. "Well before working for PBS, I've been watching PBS for a millennium, which has brought me to the PBS app on Apple TV, that is, I liked the content," she said.

This is not the first time that PBS has been swept away by larger changes promulgated by major technology companies. Last year, YouTube began tagging videos of government – backed news sources with the goal of improving transparency for viewers and helping them understand the potential motivations for content that is being made. they see. This included the content of PBS, which complained of being unjustly grouped with broadcasters such as RT, funded by the Russian government. Also last year, PBS was among a number of media that Facebook began treating as political advertisers and problem-focused when they promoted their content. The PBS issues with YouTube and Facebook have since been resolved, but both have taken time.

"I have probably now offended Apple, Facebook and Google. Well done, Paula, joked Kerger Tuesday.


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