Texas sues Netflix for advertising ‘bait and switch’ and spying
Texas sues Netflix for advertising ‘bait and switch’ and spying
德克萨斯州起诉 Netflix：指控其广告“诱导式欺诈”及监视用户
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has filed a lawsuit against Netflix, accusing the company of turning its back on its promise to remain ad-free and safe for kids. The lawsuit, filed on Monday, claims Netflix has “opened Texans’ data for inspection by the same Big Ad Tech community it once criticized for exploiting users in this same way.”
德克萨斯州总检察长肯·帕克斯顿（Ken Paxton）对 Netflix 提起诉讼，指控该公司背弃了其保持无广告和儿童安全的承诺。周一提交的诉讼称，Netflix 已经“向曾经被其批评为剥削用户的同一批大型广告科技公司开放了德州人的数据以供审查。”
In the lawsuit, Paxton claims Netflix drove up subscriptions by promoting its platform as an “escape from Big Tech surveillance.” But that changed when Netflix introduced an ad-supported streaming plan in 2022, something co-founder Reed Hastings promised not to do. Its move into digital advertising allowed Netflix to use “the mountains of data it quietly extracted from the children and families,” the lawsuit alleges.
在诉讼中，帕克斯顿声称 Netflix 曾通过宣传其平台是“逃离大型科技公司监视的避风港”来拉动订阅量。但当 Netflix 在 2022 年推出含广告的流媒体套餐时，情况发生了变化，而这正是联合创始人里德·黑斯廷斯（Reed Hastings）曾承诺不会做的事情。诉讼指控称，Netflix 进入数字广告领域，使其能够利用“从儿童和家庭中悄悄提取的海量数据”。
Paxton accuses Netflix of building a “behavior-surveillance program” that involves collecting information about “user events,” like their location, the device they’re using, search terms, how they rate content, and more. The streaming service is accused of opening this information to data brokers like Experian and Acxiom:
帕克斯顿指责 Netflix 建立了一个“行为监视程序”，涉及收集有关“用户事件”的信息，例如他们的位置、所使用的设备、搜索词、对内容的评分等。该流媒体服务被指控向 Experian 和 Acxiom 等数据经纪人开放了这些信息：
Netflix’s years-long bait-and-switch has led the company right to where it promised never to be: addicting children and families to its platform, mining those users for data, and then converting that data into lucrative intelligence for global advertising juggernauts.
Netflix 多年来的“诱导式欺诈”行为，将公司带到了它曾承诺绝不会去的地方：让儿童和家庭沉迷于其平台，挖掘这些用户的数据，然后将这些数据转化为全球广告巨头们利润丰厚的情报。
Netflix’s ad-supported tier has seen a surge in growth since its launch, with subscribers to the Basic tier more than doubling to 70 million from 2024 to 2025. In January, the streaming giant reported earning $1.5 billion from ads in 2025. This isn’t the first time that Netflix has faced legal issues in Texas, as a grand jury in Tyler County indicted the streamer over its Cuties film in 2020.
Netflix 的含广告套餐自推出以来增长迅猛，基础套餐的订阅用户数从 2024 年到 2025 年翻了一番多，达到 7000 万。今年 1 月，这家流媒体巨头报告称 2025 年通过广告获得了 15 亿美元的收入。这并非 Netflix 首次在德克萨斯州面临法律问题，泰勒县的大陪审团曾在 2020 年因其电影《娇娃》（Cuties）对该公司提起过诉讼。
In addition to accusing Netflix of an advertising “bait-and-switch,” Paxton claims Netflix misled subscribers about child safety, citing its autoplay feature that’s enabled by default across adults’ and kids’ profiles. “Netflix is not the ad-free and kid-friendly platform it claims to be. Instead, it has misled consumers while exploiting their private data to make billions,” Paxton says in the press release.
除了指控 Netflix 存在广告“诱导式欺诈”外，帕克斯顿还声称 Netflix 在儿童安全问题上误导了订阅用户，并提到了其在成人和儿童资料中默认开启的自动播放功能。帕克斯顿在新闻稿中表示：“Netflix 并非其所声称的那样是一个无广告且对儿童友好的平台。相反，它在误导消费者的同时，还利用他们的私人数据赚取了数十亿美元。”
Netflix spokesperson Jamil Walker says in an emailed statement to The Verge that Paxton’s lawsuit “lacks merit and is based on inaccurate and distorted information:”
Netflix 发言人贾米尔·沃克（Jamil Walker）在给《The Verge》的一份电子邮件声明中表示，帕克斯顿的诉讼“缺乏法律依据，且基于不准确和扭曲的信息”：
Netflix takes our members’ privacy seriously and complies with privacy and data‑protection laws everywhere we operate. We look forward to addressing the Texas Attorney General’s allegations in court and further explaining our industry-leading, kid‑friendly parental controls and transparent privacy practices.
“Netflix 非常重视会员的隐私，并遵守我们在各地运营的隐私和数据保护法律。我们期待在法庭上回应德克萨斯州总检察长的指控，并进一步解释我们行业领先的、对儿童友好的家长控制功能以及透明的隐私实践。”
Paxton accuses Netflix of violating the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act, and asks the court to block the streamer’s “unlawful collection and disclosure” of user data, as well as to disable autoplay by default on kids’ profiles.
帕克斯顿指控 Netflix 违反了《德克萨斯州欺骗性贸易行为法》，并要求法院阻止该流媒体平台“非法收集和披露”用户数据，以及禁用儿童资料中的默认自动播放功能。