A reminder to parents: kids are spending hours on social media platforms and streaming services every day, but privacy safeguards often fall short of what is promised.

TikTok’s $400 million settlement with the Justice Department last week is more than a costly resolution of past allegations. It’s a reminder that social-media privacy protections often matter most when they protect children. The government alleged that TikTok allowed users under 13 to bypass its Kids Mode and enabled the collection of personal information without parental consent, in violation of the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act. TikTok and ByteDance have not admitted liability, but the deal ranks among the largest recoveries ever obtained in a COPPA case: $300 million is due immediately, with another $100 million payable after a prior consent decree is vacated.

TikTok is not alone in facing scrutiny over children’s data. The FTC’s recent Disney settlement required a $10 million penalty over allegations that personal data was collected from children watching kid-directed YouTube videos without the required notice or parental consent. Taken together, the cases show that regulators are increasingly focusing on whether platforms can reliably identify child-directed experiences and limit data collection accordingly.

For families, the advice is straightforward: treat every social platform as a data-collection service first and an entertainment service second. Privacy settings, account-age accuracy, parental controls, device-level permissions, and regular conversations about what children share online remain the strongest everyday safeguards, even as platforms promise they’ll do better.