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The Federal Trade Commission has reportedly turned its attention to YouTube over the platform’s practices around blocking social media accounts. The FTC has not made any public announcements referencing an investigation into YouTube for account blocking or terminations, and the agency’s current focus remains on privacy and data practices rather than account suspensions.
YouTube’s regulatory history with the FTC
The FTC and YouTube reached a landmark settlement in 2019, with the platform paying a $136M civil penalty for violating the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act. That case centered on YouTube’s handling of child-directed content, specifically how the platform collected personal information from kids without parental consent.
More recently, Disney agreed to a $10M settlement in December 2025 over FTC allegations that the company had mislabeled YouTube videos.
A platform already under pressure on account management
YouTube has taken sweeping action against accounts it suspects belong to underage users, particularly in response to Australia’s social media laws that took effect on December 10, 2025. In anticipation of those regulations, YouTube acted on hundreds of thousands of suspected underage accounts in Australia alone.
At the same time, YouTube restored accounts in 2025 that had been removed under policies that are no longer in effect, specifically those related to COVID-19 misinformation and election integrity content.
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