Yes, mostly. The official Dailymotion site and app haven't been tied to malware, and no breach has been confirmed since 2016. The things actually worth knowing about are older and more mundane than most "is it safe" articles suggest: a decade-old password leak, an ad load some viewers find heavy, and a cluster of third-party "Dailymotion downloader" sites that have nothing to do with Dailymotion's own security.
This review covers what's verified, what's outdated advice, and where a VPN protects you on Dailymotion, and where it simply doesn't.
Has Dailymotion had a data breach?
Dailymotion has had one confirmed breach. In October 2016, attackers accessed data connected to roughly 85.2 million accounts, exposing usernames, email addresses, and passwords for a portion of those users. BBC News covered the disclosure at the time, and the data itself later surfaced through LeakedSource, the breach-notification service that first flagged it publicly.
Scale it against context: Dailymotion had a large global audience in 2016, so the breach touched a meaningful share of accounts, not the whole platform. It's also nearly a decade old now. No comparable incident has been confirmed since, and there's no evidence of an active or ongoing breach today.
If you created a Dailymotion account before 2016 and never changed the password, that's the one practical thing to fix. Everyone else is looking at old news, not a current risk.
What does a "clean" security scan actually check?
Run dailymotion.com through VirusTotal or Sucuri SiteCheck and it comes back clean. That's a real result, but it answers a narrower question than most readers assume.
These scanners check a domain against databases of known malware signatures, phishing kits, and blocklisted hosts. A clean result means Dailymotion isn't currently flagged for those specific threats. It says nothing about how much data the site collects, whether its ad partners track visitors across other sites, or whether an unlisted vulnerability exists that hasn't been reported yet.
Treat a clean scan as one data point in the picture, not a full audit. It's a reasonable floor. It isn't a ceiling.
Are Dailymotion downloader sites safe to use?
The official dailymotion.com site and the App Store and Google Play apps are the versions worth trusting. The risk sits one step removed, in the ecosystem of third-party "Dailymotion downloader," "Dailymotion to MP4," and similar sites that promise to save videos from the platform.
Dailymotion doesn't run these sites, and most of the malware complaints that show up online under Dailymotion's name actually trace back to them. The pattern is familiar across video platforms: a downloader page wraps a fake "Download" button in ad scripts, redirect chains, or a bundled installer that has nothing to do with the video you came for.
If a page asks you to install a browser extension, click through several ads before anything happens, or offers a "faster" download after the first one fails, that's a third-party downloader site doing what it does, not Dailymotion. Search "Dailymotion downloader" and most of the first-page results aren't dailymotion.com at all. They're ad-heavy converter sites with URLs that have nothing to do with the platform whose name they're borrowing.
What data does Dailymotion collect, and who oversees it?
Dailymotion is a French company owned by Canal+, part of the Vivendi media group, and its data practices fall under GDPR with France's CNIL (Commission Nationale de l'Informatique et des Libertés) as the supervisory authority. That's more useful to know than a generic "GDPR compliant" label, because CNIL is the specific body a user can file a complaint with if something goes wrong.
Like most ad-supported video platforms, Dailymotion collects viewing history, device information, and IP addresses, and shares some of that with advertising partners for targeting. That's standard for the free, ad-supported model, not something unique to Dailymotion. Creating an account to comment or upload adds an email address and display name to what's collected.
What permissions does the Dailymotion app ask for?
The Dailymotion app requests a limited, fairly standard set of permissions on both iOS and Android: network access, which it needs to stream video, and storage access, for offline downloads where the app offers them. On iOS, opening the app for the first time also triggers Apple's App Tracking Transparency prompt, asking whether Dailymotion and its ad partners can track activity across other apps.
On a fresh install, the App Tracking Transparency prompt appears before the home feed loads, not buried in a settings menu. Declining it doesn't break the app. It limits ad targeting, which is the safer default for most people, regardless of which video app is asking.
Is Dailymotion safe for kids?
Not without supervision. Dailymotion doesn't have a separate kids' app or YouTube Kids-level content filtering, and moderation relies more heavily on user reports and Dailymotion's own review team, so mature content isn't caught as consistently.
The stronger setup pairs two tools instead of one. A DNS-level filter like CleanBrowsing or OpenDNS blocks categories of content at the network level, before a page ever loads, on any device connected to that network. Dailymotion's own Age Gate restricts what a signed-in account can see, based on the birth date entered. One works at the network layer, the other at the account layer. A kid can slip past either alone; pairing them closes both gaps at once.
How does Dailymotion compare to YouTube for safety?
| Dailymotion | YouTube | |
|---|---|---|
| Confirmed breaches | One, October 2016 (~85.2M accounts) | None publicly confirmed at similar scale |
| Content moderation | User reports plus a platform review team | Automated detection plus human review, more mature |
| Dedicated kids' product | No | Yes, YouTube Kids |
| Malware risk (official app/site) | Low; risk concentrated in third-party downloader sites | Low; same third-party downloader pattern exists |
| Primary GDPR regulator | CNIL (France) | Irish Data Protection Commission |
Neither platform is meaningfully riskier than the other on the official app or site. YouTube's advantage is a decade-plus head start on child-safety tooling and moderation scale, not a fundamentally different security posture.
Is Dailymotion's advertising a safety risk?
Ads aren't a security risk by themselves, but they're a common complaint. Reviews on Trustpilot and similar platforms describe Dailymotion as ad-heavy, with pre-roll and mid-roll breaks that interrupt playback more than users expect from a free service.
That's an annoyance, not a malware vector, as long as taps and clicks stay inside the Dailymotion app or dailymotion.com itself. The risk shows up when an ad or a "download" button leads somewhere else entirely, which loops back to the third-party downloader sites covered above.
Is Dailymotion legal, and where is it restricted?
Watching content on Dailymotion is legal. Uploading copyrighted material without a license isn't, and Dailymotion has faced real consequences over hosted piracy: a French court fined the platform €1.3 million in a case brought by broadcaster TF1 over unlicensed uploads.
A handful of governments also restrict access to Dailymotion, for reasons unrelated to the platform's security. China blocks it as part of its broader internet filtering system, the same infrastructure that restricts most foreign video platforms. Russia ordered domestic ISPs to block Dailymotion in 2017 following a court ruling over unlicensed content. Kazakhstan has restricted access since 2011 for similar regulatory reasons.
None of that reflects on whether Dailymotion is safe to use. It reflects local content and telecom regulation, not a security assessment of the platform itself.
How can you browse Dailymotion more privately?
A VPN doesn't make Dailymotion safer, and it doesn't touch what Dailymotion collects once someone is signed in. What it does is encrypt the connection between a device and the internet, so an internet provider, or anyone else on the same network, can't see which pages are loading or intercept that traffic.
That matters most in one common situation: streaming on public or shared Wi-Fi, at a cafe, airport, or hotel. Unencrypted ad-tracking pixels and analytics scripts on many video sites can expose viewing activity and an IP address to others on that same network. VPN Super encrypts the connection and hides the IP address from Dailymotion's ad-tracking network and from anyone else sharing that Wi-Fi.
On public or shared networks, VPN Super also helps access other streaming platforms securely, encrypting the connection the same way it does on Dailymotion.
Recommended setup: connect through VPN Super's Premium servers before opening Dailymotion on a public or shared network. VPN Super's server network spans a wide range of countries, with the exact footprint varying slightly by platform.
| A VPN protects | A VPN doesn't protect |
|---|---|
| Your connection from being intercepted on public Wi-Fi | Against malware on third-party downloader sites |
| Your IP address from Dailymotion's ad-tracking network | What Dailymotion itself collects once you're signed in |
| Your browsing from casual monitoring by an ISP | Against phishing links inside ads or comments |
What's the safest way to use Dailymotion?
- Stick to dailymotion.com or the official App Store and Google Play listings. Skip downloader and "to-MP4" sites entirely.
- Keep your device's operating system and antivirus software current, especially on Windows.
- Decline the App Tracking Transparency prompt on iOS if you'd rather not be tracked across other apps.
- For a child's account, pair a DNS-level filter with Dailymotion's Age Gate rather than relying on either alone.
- On public or shared Wi-Fi, connect through VPN Super before opening Dailymotion or any other streaming site. Download VPN Super if you haven't already.
Frequently asked questions
Does Dailymotion have viruses?
No. The official site and app scan clean on VirusTotal and Sucuri, and there's no evidence of malware distributed through Dailymotion itself. Malware associated with "Dailymotion" online almost always traces back to unofficial downloader sites, not dailymotion.com.
Is Dailymotion safe from hackers?
Dailymotion has had one confirmed breach, in October 2016, affecting roughly 85.2 million accounts. Nothing similar has been reported since. If you have an old Dailymotion account, a unique password is worth setting now, since any account database can be compromised eventually, regardless of platform.
Is Dailymotion safe for kids?
Not on its own. There's no dedicated kids' app or YouTube Kids-level filtering. Pairing a DNS-level filter, such as CleanBrowsing or OpenDNS, with the in-app Age Gate is the more reliable setup for a child's account.
Is the Dailymotion app safe on iPhone and Android?
Yes. Both apps request standard permissions, network access and, where offered, storage for offline downloads, plus Apple's App Tracking Transparency prompt on iOS. Neither app has been flagged for malware or excessive permission requests.
Is Dailymotion legal to use?
Watching content on Dailymotion is legal. Uploading copyrighted material without a license isn't, and Dailymotion has faced legal consequences over hosted piracy, including a €1.3 million fine from a French court in a case brought by broadcaster TF1.
Can Dailymotion be trusted with personal data?
Dailymotion collects standard data for an ad-supported platform: viewing history, device data, and IP address, and it falls under GDPR oversight from France's CNIL. That's a real regulatory backstop, though it doesn't mean Dailymotion collects less data than any other free, ad-supported video platform.
Why is Dailymotion blocked in some countries?
Mostly for regulatory reasons that have nothing to do with the platform's security: China's broader internet filtering system, a 2017 Russian court order over unlicensed content, and a restriction in Kazakhstan in place since 2011.
Dailymotion's official site and app hold up fine under a security review. The breach is a decade old, the ad load is heavier than some competitors, and the actual malware risk lives on third-party downloader sites that have nothing to do with the platform itself. Knowing which of those is which is most of the work.
