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. 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.
Princess Town: Hospital Games gameplay tasks the player to check the princess pregnancy health to make sure there are no complications. The game has seven different rooms where players can go on a thrilling crusade by touring to see every item and what a player might find. In the game, players can choose their character, clothes, and different types of activities to participate in. The subject matter in the about this app, says, “life in Princess Castle.” The visual content and animation has bright colorful animated cartoon style characters with child friendly graphic designs and backgrounds. This game is interactive and engaging for children in which they can learn skills through imagination animation.
There are advertisements that play during the game and some that spin while playing within the app. There are ads directed to a general audience, such as, “Lie Detector Test, and Prank Your Friend,” and other ads directed to children, for example,”My Cat and Cutie Reveal Doll Unbox Games.”
The app is rated E for Everyone in the Google Play store. There is no age gate but there is in-app purchasing. A review posted in October of 2023 on the Google Play store says, “it so good and im 8 year old.” Another review posted in September of 2023 says, “I’m also 10 and I luv this game I’m inspired to be a doctor.” The reviews show that children use the app.
Privacy:
The developer’s privacy policy says, “we hereby prohibit any User under the age of 13 from actively and directly providing us with personal information...may passively collect a persistent device identifier…does not permit Third Parties from Kids any information that may personally identify an individual.”
Find Pixalate's full catalogue of reviews in our CTV and Mobile App Review Page
Screenshots of Princess Town: Hospital Games
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.
