Welcome to Pixalate’s CTV & Mobile App Manual Reviews According to COPPA, a series containing the detailed factors the Trust & Safety Advisory Board educators used to assess an app’s child-directedness.
The educators manually review thousands of mobile apps available in the Google Play & Apple App Stores as well as connected TV (CTV) apps from the Roku Channel Store and Amazon Fire TV App Store using the COPPA Rule factors shown below & make those results available to the public at ratings.pixalate.com.
This post takes a look at a popular mobile app (1 million+ downloads) from the Google Play Store and Apple App Store. Our reviewer discusses how the subjective factors set forth in the COPPA Rule apply to the app and factor into the reviewer's determination as to whether the app is child-directed or general audience (i.e., it is not targeting children).
The teacher will indicate the factors they relied upon in their assessment using the 10 factors shown below that reflect the 10 child-directed factors in the COPPA Rule.
Magic Tiles 3: Piano Game is a music-based game where the player can choose a song to play along to, and then tap boxes on the screen to keep the music going. Upon launching the game, the player can choose their favorite genres of music to curate the tracks offered. Additionally, you are asked to choose an age bracket, from “under 15” up to “55 and above”, or “Prefer not to say”. It is unclear why the age bracket is required, whether it affects the choice of songs for information and privacy purposes, or perhaps both.
The game is played by tapping boxes as they move down the screen, similar to Guitar Hero and Rock Band games. There is a library of songs to choose from, and some children’s songs are included, such as Baby Shark and Crazy Frog. Each song has a rating of Easy, Medium, or Hard. The children’s songs are rated Easy.
When playing through the tracks, the song will stop if the user fails to tap the box in time. The game gives the option to watch an ad to continue or subscribe to VIP for a rewind option. Battle Mode gives the option to play against a randomly matched player, or select Custom Match to play against friends. Additionally, the game can be synced with Facebook to compare ranking against friends.
The app reviews on the Google Play and Apple App Stores show submissions from a mixed audience, including younger players who reference playing with their siblings and having the game downloaded by a parent. Within the game, users can select Under 15 as an age range option. It does not specify that users must be over 13 to use the app.
Privacy:
The Developer’s Privacy Policy has a brief section dealing with Children’s Privacy. They state they do not knowingly collect information from children under 13 and will delete any children’s information collected without parental consent.
Find Pixalate's full catalogue of reviews in our CTV and Mobile App Review Page
Screenshots of Magic Tiles 3
Pixalate’s Trust and Safety Advisory Board was created to bring in individuals with experience using child-directed apps in the classroom to review and assess which apps are child-directed. This manual review process serves to quality check Pixalate’s automated review process. See our full methodology for more information.
Disclaimer
This blog post published by Pixalate is available for informational purposes only and is not considered legal advice. By viewing this blog post, the reader understands and agrees that there is no attorney-client relationship between the reader and the blog publisher. The blog should not be used as a substitute for legal advice from a licensed professional attorney in the applicable jurisdiction(s), and readers are urged to consult their own legal counsel on any specific legal questions concerning any specific situation. The content of this blog post reflects Pixalate's opinions with respect to factors that Pixalate believes may be useful to the digital media industry. Pixalate's opinions are just that, opinions, which means that they are neither facts nor guarantees; and this blog post is not intended to impugn the standing or reputation of any entity, person or app, but instead, to report findings pertaining to mobile and Connected TV (CTV) apps.
