FTC Prioritizes Children’s Online Safety in 5-Year Strategic Plan

The Federal Trade Commission’s new strategic plan, which covers the next five years, modified the regulator’s mission statement by returning the phrase “without unduly burdening legitimate business activity,” FTC Chairman Andrew N. Ferguson wrote in a message presenting the plan.

In his message, which is among the first pages of the “Federal Trade Commission Strategic Plan: Fiscal Years 2026-2030” released Friday (April 3), Ferguson said the return of this phrase reflects “our commitment to end overregulation of American businesses that compete fairly and deal honestly with consumers.”

Highlighting another change in the new strategic plan, Ferguson said the FTC added language about protecting children online, adding that this is “one of the most important consumer protection issues of our time.”

Within the strategic plan, the FTC said that some of its most valuable work is its ongoing efforts to enforce the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), which forbids specified website operators from collecting, using or disclosing the personal data of children without their parents’ consents.

The FTC also said that it is exploring how it can protect children and support families by using its new authority under the Take It Down Act.

It was reported in January that the Take It Down Act, which was signed into law in 2025, criminalizes the publication of nonconsensual intimate deepfakes and imposes strict takedown obligations on covered platforms.

The regulator also publishes online safety tips for parents and children, according to the strategic plan.

A third change highlighted by Ferguson in his message is that “we have improved our performance metrics by eliminating those that were not providing actionable data and by adding an improved cost-benefit metric that will clearly measure the FTC’s value to the American taxpayer.”

The FTC also announced Friday that it submitted its fiscal year 2027 budget request to Congress. In it, the FTC seeks $426.71 million and 1,183 full-time equivalent (FTE) positions for that fiscal year, the regulator said in a press release.

The regulator used as its baseline the fiscal year 2025 enacted appropriations level for fiscal year 2026, which was $425.70 million and 1,183 FTEs, according to the budget request.