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 game which is available from the Roku Channel Store, Amazon Fire TV Store, and the Samsung CTV 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.
Ninja Kidz shows videos based around a family of five children who all have black belts in multi-discipline martial arts. They use their gymnastic and martial arts abilities in the videos featured on the app. They have over 20m subscribers on YouTube and the same content is available on the CTV apps, currently just under 300 videos. The videos all have bright and colorful cover shots, and feature exciting titles such as “Who’s the Best Ninja?” and “Turno Battle!” They also create their songs and have music videos to accompany them.
Ninja Kidz as a brand has a broad reach, with a Ninja Kidz Club that viewers can subscribe to which allows access to Ninja classes. Many of the videos will encourage children to join in and try the challenges for themselves, such as their gymnastics challenges (e.g. girl vs boy or superhero challenges.) There is a strong emphasis on participation and getting viewers involved.
The Myler family are the stars of Ninja Kidz: Ashton, Bryton, Payton, Paxton, and Kayson, are all aged between 19 and 9 at the time of writing. Their father makes appearances but the children are the main focus of the channel. Seeing other children take part in these fun activities is a big attraction for kids, especially when they are skilled martial artists!
Privacy
The FutureToday Privacy Policy discusses children’s privacy and states that they comply with COPPA in the parts of their services which are targeted at children under 13. They state that they do not knowingly collect children’s data that could be used to identify them. They ask that parents instruct their children not to share their name, email, home address, etc. without their parents' permission.
Screenshots of Ninja Kidz
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.
