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Mattel Interactive Responds To Privacy Issues
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 In response to public complaints about privacy, Mattel Interactive announced that the company would provide a tool that removes software that was surreptitiously placed on customers' computers and is designed to transmit and receive information to Mattel. The software, known as �Brodcast,� can be found in many of Mattel Interactive's popular children's educational software, including the �Reader Rabbit� series and games featuring the cartoon characters �Arthur� and �Little Bear.� Several published reports and consumer complaints prompted Mattel to allow users to uninstall the software, but a Mattel Interactive spokeswoman said the company decided to stop using the software in April, when the federal Children's Online Privacy Protection Act went into effect. That law prohibits Web sites or online services from collecting personal information from children under 13. Mattel maintains that its software doesn't fall under the act because the company is not a Web site or online service and the information transmitted isn't personal. Instead, it sends a product identification number and some technical information and downloads advertising products targeted toward the user. Still, the company decided to stop. �Due to public concern around the privacy issue, and as part of our ongoing effort to meet consumer interests, we made a decision to revise the existing program last year and then later eliminated it altogether,� Mattel Interactive said in a statement. Last year's revision consisted of modifying the product to make sure that the user knew it was being installed and offered an option not to install it at all. In April, Mattel's servers stopped communicating with Brodcast. The odd name, Brodcast, refers to Broderbund, a software company bought by The Learning Company. Broderbund designed the original software as a marketing technique. But Mattel then bought The Learning Company in May 1999, making both it and Broderbund brand names under the Mattel Interactive umbrella. Two months ago, just as the company decided to shut down Brodcast, Mattel Interactive was put up for sale. Given the company's transformations, spokeswoman Susan Salminen said that Brodcast was rarely used. �I don't think that anything was done with it,� she said. �It wasn't utilized very much because of our company situation.� Mattel will have a Windows 98 uninstall program for Brodcast available by the close of business Monday, Salminen said. Tools to eliminate the program on other platforms will be posted later that week. [Posted 6/26/2000]
  
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