Social media and chat companies must tell FTC how they use information

Nine tech companies, including Reddit, Discord, TikTok, Facebook and Amazon, must tell the US Federal Trade Commission how they collect information and determine which ads to show to which users.

The FTC wants to use those answers to verify whether the processing of information is done legally, the government agency reports. The FTC wants to know from the companies how they collect information about users, how they determine who sees which advertisements and how the companies use algorithms for this. Companies should also answer questions about how they try to encourage users to use their services more and how their practices might affect children and teenagers.

FTC has posed the questions to Amazon, TikTok parent company ByteDance, Discord, Facebook, Reddit, Snap, Twitter, WhatsApp and YouTube. The companies were given a month and a half to reply.

With the answers, the FTC likely wants to see whether the companies are collecting and using information lawfully, and whether the companies are responsibly dealing with children and teens on their platforms.