Fortnite developer reaches $520m settlement over data privacy, deceptive billing allegations

In brief

Fortnite developer Epic Games has reached settlements with the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) over complaints the company collected the personal information of users under the age of 13 without obtaining consent from their parents, and that it deceived users into unintentionally making in-game purchases.

The data privacy settlement amounts to $275m and the deceptive billing settlement will force Epic to refund users $245m.

The former is the largest penalty ever obtained for violating an FTC rule, while the latter is the FTC’s largest refund amount in a gaming case, and its largest administrative order in history.