Hulu Takes PTC’s Suggestion and Adds PIN-Restrictions to Parental Controls

LOS ANGELES (September 22, 2021) – The Parents Television and Media Council (PTC) welcomed Hulu’s parental controls update that added PIN-restrictions to prevent kids from flipping between child and adult profiles – a change the PTC called on Hulu to make after finding that Hulu’s parental controls were the worst of all the top streaming platforms.

“We are glad Hulu made an improvement to its parental controls by adding PIN-restrictions to a user’s profile. This is a simple, yet critical, change that we had urged Hulu to implement after our research found were extremely lax compared to other top streamers,” said PTC President Tim Winter.

“But Hulu still has to make significant improvements to make its parental controls as good as or better than the other top streamers. For instance, children can still access age-inappropriate PG-13 and TV-14-rated content through a ‘kid’ profile, and Hulu should work on a solution to prevent that from happening. Even a ‘teen’ profile allows the user to access TV-MA or R-rated content. With Hulu’s platform containing adult content like ‘teen comedy’ PEN15, A Teacher, Harlots, among others, it is imperative that Disney-owned Hulu is prioritizing child safety.

“All streaming platforms should work together to develop and implement standardized industry best practices for parental controls, given the lack of uniformity between platforms. Parents should be able to trust that all platforms are prioritizing consistent parental controls, especially given the popularity of streaming. Just as car manufacturers must meet the same safety criteria, so should streamers with influential – and potentially harmful – content, ” Winter said.