Texas Sues Netflix Over 5 Petabytes of Daily Data Collection and Kids’ Autoplay Design
Updated
Updated · Variety · May 11
Texas Sues Netflix Over 5 Petabytes of Daily Data Collection and Kids’ Autoplay Design
3 articles · Updated · Variety · May 11
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton filed suit in Collin County on May 11, accusing Netflix of violating the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act by secretly tracking users, including children, and making its service addictive.
The complaint says Netflix logs about 5 petabytes of user-behavior data a day, processes more than 10 million events per second and feeds over 40,000 internal microservices while sharing or matching data with advertisers, brokers and ad-tech platforms.
Netflix is also accused of a bait-and-switch: after years of saying it would avoid advertising, it launched an ad-supported tier in 2022 while allegedly failing to fully disclose the scope of behavioral tracking behind ad measurement.
Paxton seeks injunctions to halt unlawful data collection, force autoplay off by default on kids’ profiles and win civil penalties, adding to scrutiny of how streaming platforms handle household and children’s viewing data.
As states sue tech giants over data, is your streaming history the next battleground for privacy rights?
Netflix promised an escape from surveillance. Is it now building a billion-dollar ad empire on your private data?
Is the default autoplay on your child's profile a convenience or a tool for data-driven profit?