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COPPA, What Are You Doing About It?
Some more information from michael : COPPA shouldn't affect most sites. Unless your site is targeted toward children and actively solicits personal information (name, e-mail address, regular address, age, etc.) from children, you probably have to do nothing. Here's a snippet, straight from the FTC:
"If you operate a commercial Web site or an online service directed to children under 13 that collects personal information from children or if you operate a general audience Web site and have actual knowledge that it collects personal information from children, you must comply with the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act."
"Children" is defined to mean "people under the age of 13". So unless your site is directed to kids 12 and under and collects information from visitors OR you collect information and you know that you're collecting information from kids 12 and under (for instance, you make them register and include an age category with "12 and under" as one of the choices), you don't need to do much at all. Just don't ask their age!
Slashdot received reports that Yahoo was forcing people to provide credit card information in order to register for services. Well, part of Yahoo is directed specifically at children, and Yahoo does collect personal information, so they're concerned. The submissions implied Yahoo was doing this for ALL of their services though, which seems like overkill - a ploy to justify seeking more information from adults (a credit card allows Yahoo to identify you precisely, of course). I would avoid any online service that required adults to provide a credit card or anything similar. If some service is using COPPA as an excuse to demand intrusive information from adults, call them on it.
The law is intended to slow down (hardly stop) sites designed to market to little kids. Registering as "12 and under" at Disney's site, for instance, seeks my name, date of birth, gender, zip code, e-mail address (more than enough information to identify me exactly), mother's maiden name and parent's e-mail address - a veritable bonanza of information. I was waiting for them to ask me for a DNA sample. Disney sends an e-mail to the parental e-mail address. Currently Disney does NOT comply with COPPA; the e-mail sent does not in any way notify the parent that they can opt-out of the information collection, it just says "We collected this information from your child and we're really good people so you can trust us with it. And it's a good thing you can trust us, because we've got it now, and we're not giving it back." Compare the FTC guidelines:
"The notice to parents must contain the same information included on the notice on the Web site. In addition, an operator must notify a parent that it wishes to collect personal information from the child; that the parent's consent is required for the collection, use and disclosure of the information; and how the parent can provide consent. The notice to parents must be written clearly and understandably, and must not contain any unrelated or confusing information. An operator may use any one of a number of methods to notify a parent, including sending an email message to the parent or a notice by postal mail."
So, Disney doesn't comply. But they still have a few days. You may want to check out the FTC's information page which has all you need to know about COPPA. If you want to steer clear of any problems whatsoever, it's simple: don't market to little kids. It takes a certain amount of slime to market to people under age 13 anyway - since they don't have any money, you have to brainwash them to pester their parents. If you do want to market to little kids, COPPA isn't much of a barrier. You may need to notify the parents, but you can simply condition your entertainment service on the provision of information and most parents will probably comply. Then you can market to your heart's content, including selling the information to other companies. COPPA is a pretty feeble barrier, and I don't have much sympathy for anyone who gets tripped up by it. We've already seen that the FTC refuses to investigate even large-scale privacy fraud on the part of Internet companies, so it seems extremely doubtful that they're going to deploy COPPA Vice Squads to go out and enforce compliance. Unless you're a really big company in really flagrant violation of the law, you have nothing to worry about.
"an operator must notify a parent that it wishes to collect personal information from the child; that the parent's consent is required for the collection, use and disclosure of the information"
In order to notify a parent don't they have to already have collected some information?
You can't think of a single one?
Such as, perhaps, Slashdot collecting one's real email address for granting a login account?
Collecting one's state of residence before allowing one to participate in a contest that's illegal in some states?
Collecting one's zip code to provide TV listings that actually relate to what's on one's cable offerings?
I think you didn't try very hard to think of those reasons.
Frankly, I think the solution is to simply bar access to one's site completely to anyone who identifies himself as under 13, and blame this law for it. If enough angry parents call their Congressman with complaints about, say, Yahoo suddenly being inaccessible, perhaps this law will be rethought.
WTF is the government doing in this, anyway? I can protect my kid just fine without their help, thankyouverymuch.
So. My kids get privacy protection, and I have to expressly give my permission for their information to be stored somewhere.
Why on earth can't these same things be applied to myself? *I* want these protections! You shouldn't be able to harvest information about ME, EITHER!
Wouldn't this be just the inverse of the Leisure Suit Larry (old version) quiz you used to get to verify you were old enough to play?
hmmm.... that didn't seem to stop me then from getting in...
Wheeeee
So, it seems that I could set up a magnet site outside the US for kiddies, collect their info, destroy any info from non-US kiddies, and sell the resulting mailing list to US companies. On the surface, at least, this looks safe: not "violating" the privacy of any of the locals, so the local cops won't have any excuse to hassle me, if I've chosen my local wisely. And I'm not doing anything inside the US, so I'm certainly safe there too. The only thing which could screw this up is a US law forbidding US companies from using such data. Try enforcing that one!
See what I've been reading.
My favorite possession is a copy of Quake, but I still own a car and a house! Does that make me under 13 ? On second thoughts don't answer that
:-).
Actually, as a 36 year old adult, I habitually lie to market segment polls i.e over/under state my income, lie about my age, put the wrong address (where possible) etc.
I do pity the poor 120 year old earning $200K per year living in Swaziland who is getting my junk mail tho'
Donte Alistair Anderson Roberts - hi son!
Karma: Chameleon
Why, I'm doing my part to smash the state and capitalism. How about you?
Anarchist Revolution. NOW!
Thank you, that is all...
Michael Chisari
mchisari@usa.net
Any time I hear sombody talkning about "Parents right" it is very clear that they have completley forgoten what it is like to be in high school, your children are alrady out of your hands, the are infact people. All you acomplish by trying to trow you weight around is to iritate and alianate them. And no I am not in high school, I have not been in high school for many years, I just have a memory!
"If you're capable of selling to kids (actually, their parents) in the US, you have enough presence in the US for the US law to get at you. "
So you think but how is that done actually? For example I live in Finland and I don't know any way how you can sue me by means of US law. It is impossible. For any legal action against me I have to violate finnish law, not US! So for, US can keep their laws and I don't have to care them.
Also I'm interested to see how this effects people like myself who *shock horror* do not live in the us...
Working for the (other) man
I'm doing my part to smash the state and capitalism.
:-)
Then surely you would welcome a law that attempts to restrict a company's ability to make money by exploiting children, the most vulnerable members of society?
Cheers,
Tim
It's official. Most of you are morons.
Information about minors (12 and under) can be collected with parental consent. But, the defination of parental consent is dependant on your usage of the information. If your usage is simply internal (i.e., you never disclose, give, or sell the infomation), then you can accept the information along with a parental email address. You then send an email to the parent with a link allowing them to opt-out. This opt-out would effectively cancel the user's registration.
If you plan on releasing, selling, or giving the information away (even to "affiliates"), you need to have much stricter rules. The rules can be so strict, in fact, as to pretty much destroy online registration unless you have a manned phone support team willing to call up parents and get permission.
Keep in mind that this only applies to sites targetting children 12 and under. If your site is targetted to 13 or over, you are exempt. Of course, you may have to prove that you aren't targetting children 12 and under.
The safest route (in my opinion) is to have two registrations. The first is for people 13 and over. This is your basic registration. The second is for kids 12 and younger. On this form, you ask for parental email. Lastly, don't give away or sell the information. In a market where personal information is a commodity, this can be a tall order.
Remind me to never let any of my friends at my computer again.
Try any of these solutions if you want to avoid violating this act:
1. Don't target your site to people under 13 as a specific demographic.
2. Don't ask for age on a registration form.
3. If you must ask for age, use a select list who's lowest band is above 13.
If you don't target kids, and have no way of knowing if your visitors are kids, you should be fine.
If you're paranoid, use option 3 for registrations. That way, any kid who registers with your site is lying when he selects anything from your mandatory select list.
Well, gotta go. Time for recess and then a nap.
--
Some people have a way with words, and some people, um, thingy.
You need to ask the kids what their age is. You have to collect (minimal) information about them, such as their email addresses.
So, now you need to get their parent's permission before you collect anything about the kid beyond his or her first name. Plus, you must provide a means for the parent to see what info you have collected about his or her child(ren) and offer the ability for the parent to remove said permission.
Bravery, Kindness, Clarity, Honesty, Compassion, Generosity
...Nothing interesting here. Just move along...
when do we get the Adult Online Privacy Protection Act? :)
They don't own the internet.
The internet dosen't exist in one physical place.
The internet is basically "Use at your own risk."
Therefore: They have no real juristiction in it.
The US is very unstable now. With the recent riots in Seattle and Washington D.C. and the numerous cases of police brutality and overreaction in these riots, "The Land of the Free" is looking more like Neo-Toyko in Akira. The tear gas canisters are being fired at point blank range, mass arrests for using the 1st amendment.
Not that this is totally bad. I kind of find this exciting. I lust over change and dynamic government. I am one of those who believe that people can take care of themselves and don't need a government looking over their shoulder.
Which brings me on-topic. We don't need this law. If parents are so worried about this, why don't they monitor their children. If the children don't want the parents to monitor them, they shouldn't do dumb things. I was an expert at formulating lies when I was younger than 13, and I would use it all the time. Why don't these kids lie about themselves? If people would just use common sense and understand that the 'net isn't anything more than a sprawl and that you have to take care of yourself in it, then we wouldn't have this problem.
"It's the little touches that make a future solid enough to be destroyed" --William S. Bourroughs
Yeah, sure, Blame Canada :-)
Considering the fact that the US of A thinks that its law applies everywhere, the US of A will probably try to impose this law on people in other countries - sort of like when the DVD CCA got an "temporary" restraining order against people outside of the US of A for violating the DMCA, even though the US of A really doesn't have jurisdiction over the countries that some of the defendants lived in. I wouldn't be surprised if the US of A attempted to do the same with respect to the COPPA.
Umm, what about protecting adults? Seriously, I don't want websites collecting info about me. Damn Real.com had to start the privacy issue by requesting all people give them their names and emails! Why is it that i have to lose all my privacy once i sign on the internet? Oh well, it's not going to change anything, im still going to give fake names, fake emails, fake everything AND start saying im 8 years old to take advantage of children's rights
"Tread softly because you tread on my dreams"
Don't blame the marketeers entirely. If parents exercised some responsibility in this area the justification for targeting penniless waifs would dry up and blow away.
I don't entirely agree with you. Here in the UK, there is growing concern at the amount of advertising that is being targeted specifically at children. This is not because their parents use money as a "quality time substitute", although doubtless some do. The concern arises precisely because it leads to children pestering their parents to buy them <insert latest must-have item here>. The advertising agencies even have a term for it - "pester power".
You do make a valid point that some parents give their children far too much money, and for the wrong reasons. However, do not be too quick to suggest stopping this as a way to stop advertisers targetting children, because it won't. If anything, it'll just cause them to increase the amonut of advertising targetted at kids, to step up the pressure on the parents.
Cheers,
Tim
It's official. Most of you are morons.
To a certain extent this is true, but a parent can't always be with h{is,er} children. Kids go to school, where there are probably computers. Kids visit friends, where there are probably computers. Kids spend time on their home PC doing homework, etc.
I have a 7 month old son, so things like this are constantly on my mind. Some day soon, some day very soon, he is going to start using the computer we have at home (he is already showing interest as he sits on my lap and we read Slashdot together -- he bangs on the keys and reaches for the screen), and I am not going to be able to be with him (as a progammer, I spend a lot of time at work). The best I can hope for is that by the time he is using it when alone, my wife and I have taught him what he should be doing and what he shouldn't be doing. Never give information out over the internet. Never make plans to meet someone you met over the internet. The same things as *I* was taught growing up about the phone -- if someone calls, and you don't know who it is, ask; if someone asks who you are, don't tell them until you know who they are; etc.
This is the fate of most regulation-type laws, unfortunately. Gun control laws tends to fail (or at least fail to live up to expectations) for the same reasons. Prohibition failed for this reason. The real answer is education -- I need to teach my kids what is right and wrong, and what is appropriate and inappropriate.
darren
Cthulhu for President!
(darren)
(Note for those browsing at +1: I'm replying to an AC's reply to dcrowleyts, not his/her post)
:-)
Well, you certainly have the right idea, although I think that you could possibly have worded it a little better
However, it is something of a thorny issue. Speaking as a parent myself (I have a 5 month old daughter), I agree that the government (in my case, that of the UK) has no place telling me how to raise my child. I intend to be a responsible parent, as does my partner (no, we're not married), and so I do not require laws like this to protect my daughter.
Unfortunately, the sad fact is that, as dcrowleyts pointed out, some parents seem to have largely abdicated responsibility for their offspring. As it is impractical to identify and point out to these parents the error of their ways (and do we even have the right to?), something does need to be done to protect their children from unscrupulous marketeers (and worse...).
I am not against the aims of this law, but I am saddened that America has so little faith in its parents that it feels it necessary to legislate to protect its children when the parents themselves should be doing it.
Cheers,
Tim
It's official. Most of you are morons.
Bullshit. Its your job to keep your kids safe, and if our freedoms put your child in peril, well its too damn bad. Thats what the concept of a 'right' is. No one can take it away, no matter what the reason. Raise your own damn kid, thier safety is your concern and responsibility, NO ONE elses.
according to high school, children HAVE no rights, they are barely even citizens
That's a fine and dandy little law for you American folk to have to deal with... but what about us foreigners?
.com .net or .org address they might have some jurisdiction (as those domains are managed from the USA)... but the worst they could do there is take away your domain name.
I suppose that if you had a
BlackNova Traders
How do you know that someone is who they say they are?
example 1: Your kid logs onto www.xrated-site-name-here.com the site ask's you to click "enter" if you are over 18. What is stopping them from clicking enter?
example 2: Your company requires you to keep information about logged on guests. How do you know they didn't lie when they signed up?
example 3: I use a@7x7x7x.com as a dummy email address so I don't get spammed.
(I check to see if 7x7x7x.com is registered because I don't want to generate spam for them.)
I lie on register forms, don't you?
This is an example of good intentions, political grandstanding and clueless execution.
* "Uncle this droid is malfunctioning" -- Luke Skywalker
First I would like to say that Parents should not be allowing 13 y/o or younger children to surf the net unsupervised and if they were not neglecting their responsibility the COPPA law would not be necessary. However, in America and probably in most developed nations, parents have abdicated their rights and responsibilities as parents in favor of governmental control and so COPPA is a necessary evil. The argument about offshore sites is a valid one but then America cannot police the entire world, yet! But we have a responsibility to police ourselves. In all I wish the law were unnecessary but lazy, uncaring parents force us to legislate the protection parents are supposed to provide but don't. Will COPPA work? No, like all other laws it will not impact the law-breakers and the law-abiding people (except Disney!!!) were already doing what is necessary to protect our childrens rights. Well that ought to stir up a whole bunch of religious zealots, Paranoids, and Flame hounds so I'll quit there.
I posted the same story a few days ago and it was declined =(...
Anyway...doesn't this mean that...
Think of it this way: If you don't know who is a "child", you don't have to employ any special tactics. A major hole in the law. If you don't ask the age, you're off scott-free.
"spare the lachrymosity when the fulminations have inveighed"
-madd
Ok, that's a good example. I'll assume you're not using the kids' names/ages/e-mails for anything other than personalization of the application. (If you're selling the data, I hope something nasty happens to you).
However, is it REALLY such a bad thing to have to get the parents' permission before collecting this information? Shouldn't the parents be checking out the service before the kids sign up anyway?
Save the whales. Feed the hungry. Free the mallocs.
"Is it even something that deserves worrying about?"
Cliff, are you kidding me? Do you want telemarketers collecting information on your child and indirectly on you through a web site? Don't you want to protect your child from blatant violations of your child's right to privacy because they don't understand that what they're doing is creating a profile under their name on some stranger's database? What if your kid goes to a site that asks for information about YOU? Hmmm... what if Disney, upon realizing that they were gathering information from a child, asks for their parents income (or puts it in cute terms like "what kind of car does your daddy drive?") Does this strike you as a problem?
The U.S. Government has been treating its citizens like children for years. Does anyone think that I could qualify under COPPA for this reason? I'd like my privacy protected, dammit.
That was Mountain Dew. It was actually considered a brilliant marketing move - give kids pagers for general use, but pay for them by advertising delivered via the pager.
...phil
...phil
"For a list of the ways which technology has failed to improve our quality of life, press 3."
I you have a site that truly wants to discriminate between the under and over 13's just give them the pokemon quiz.....To register for this site answewr the following questions:
Pikacho is:
A: a new nasal tissue
B: small and furry
...if I new anything about pokemon I could probably write something funny here but I don't, cause I'm (much) older than 13.
no sig.
As someone who has worked extensively with young people I can tell you that statement has no merit. I can't tell you how often I've been amazed to find myself among a group of adolescents with more cash in their pockets than I had in my checking account (unless it was right after payday and just prior to paying the bills). There were very few exceptions, even among those considered to be from 'low-income' families.
Unfortunately many parents today think that, since their time is used to generate money, that throwing money at their children is an acceptable substitute for spending time with them. Go hang out at a mall and watch all the pre-pubescent girls spend wads of cash on little doohickeys to stick in their hair and young boys swapping $5 US bills for arcade tokens like they were pitching pennies in a fountain -- all this with nary a parent in sight. (Yeah I'm sure that sounds sexist, but just go watch and see if it isn't accurate. You do see girls in the arcade, but often they're only watching, and I have yet to see a boy plop down good money for a handfull of multi-hued butterflies to put in his hair though.)
Don't blame the marketeers entirely. If parents exercised some responsibility in this area the justification for targeting penniless waifs would dry up and blow away.
carlos
--
As a matter of fact, I am a lawyer. But I play an actor on TV.
The Protect-Us-From-Government Protection Act
But they never seem to do that...
New XFMail home page
/bin/tcsh: Try it; you'll like it.
Everyone's ranting about "The kids will just lie and still get in." Has anyone seen that it mentions in the COPPA that you can validate a parent by collecting a credit card number and date, and a name and address to match it, and then validating that through visanet or another company. Then you know if its a parent or just little Timmy lying about his age... its very unlikely that the timster will be able to get all mommy's info to carry out the lie. A pain in the wahzoo for us site admins but what if they start forcing me to do that? Extra expense, extra hassle, driving away customers who are queasy about giving out credit card info....
** From Excite **
Date: Tue, 18 Apr 2000 14:32:30 PDT
Thank you for using Excite. We have some important Excite Member updates for you. In order to comply with new law called COPPA (Children's Online Privacy Protection Act) that protects the privacy of individuals less than 13 years old, we need to restrict your access to the Excite service. Specifically, we are sorry to inform you that your Excite Member email address [yourEmail]@excite.com will be deactivated after April 20, 2000. Excite is participating in an industry-wide effort to apply COPPA on the Web.
****
Notice that the email was sent at 2:30pm, April 18, and the account will be zapped in about 36 hours.
If you use Excite's email service, and you put bunk info in your User Profile DOB, you might want to check your mail.
If Slashdot is where the spelling-challenged go when they die, I'm in heaven.
WTF is the government doing in this, anyway? I can protect my kid just fine without their help, thankyouverymuch.
Well then i appluade you! Unfortunatly most parents don't want the responsibility and want to be able to sit thier child in front of the tv/radio/internet and not have to worry about them. Which makes sense, i mean the parent had a really hard day at work again, why should they be bothered with raising thier children now? Oh, to all you parents saying its really hard to review everything before deciding...go fuck yourself. If you don't have time to review what your kid does on the internet, don't let them on the internet, or don't let them on at all without you watching them. Same goes for tv and radio.
Incidentally, "just move offshore" is an expensive and distracting thing for a company to do, or they'd all do it to avoid taxes and other regulations. It can be done, but it carries with it a host of other logistical and legal problems.
Why am I reminded of when I was a kid and repeatedly guessing at questions about who was president before I was born, or what is used with what to make a drink just to play a really neat adventure game? Sure it took me a while, sometimes random guessing took a while, but I got in... we need to take a better approach then asking for a birthdate and/or asking silly age questions like Sierra did if we want to take a serious approach to age verification.
Wheeeee
COPPA is huge. It affects nearly everyone. What web site doesn't cater to under 13 year olds? Even if you don't actively target them as your audience, are you discouraging them?
I've really been blown away by how COPPA seems to have slipped under the radar of most web sites. This is probably the first piece I've seen in the 'media' about it.
My company, Infopop, makes community software including a popular discussion forum. We made some changes to this software to make it easier for sites to comply with the COPPA regulations. And you know what? COPPA has such a low profile that a lot of customers got upset with us. They thought COPPA was something we'd made up. They had no idea that legally their sites had to be COPPA compliant come April 21st.
I have doubts about the level of COPPA compliance we'll see among web sites. Look out for some high profile 'lets make an example of them' cases in the comming months.
I'll provide my data point, and ask for /. advice. My organization provides online courses to K-12 students. Aside from the obvious issue about who is filling out our application form, I also have a "say hello to your Instructor" page which asks registered students about their hobbies and interests.
Our application forms require payment, which implicitly blocks out small children. But the hello form...suggestions?
WAKE UP AMERICA!!!!!!!!!!! We are in the midst of a revolution within our government. Liberal forces are taking away our rights every day. And the process is accelerating. COPPA is just another peice of that puzzle.
This law is not about protecting children. It is about controlling the internet. Congress sees the internet as a menace, due to its free wheeling style. Why does Congress see the internet as a menace? Simply put, the internet allows free flow of ideas. It allows the freedom of speach our country's founders envisioned as RIGHTFULLY BELONGING TO ALL CITIZENS.
Since Congress enacted legislation to create the Department of Education, the educational standards of the United States has steadily deteriorated. For those of you who dont know, the Department of Education was touted as being a way to establish a nationwide standard of educational excellence, i.e. pump money into regions that have poor literacy rates in an effort to improve schools. While this has happened, the Department of Education has also been used by Congress for some more sinister reasons. After all, what better way to make major changes to the United States' form of government than to teach our children thier point of view.
The Department of Education mandates to school boards a selection of educational materials. Over the last 2 decades this list of materials has included text books which tramples the ideals of Washington, Jefferson, and Adams. Here in Georgia there is a fight going on about a history book that leads the students to believe we do not need the Bill of Rights. Many of the text books have a blatant "government is the solution to everything" agenda.
Now I know you saying "How does this tie in with COPPA?" Very simply this. COPPA will be used as a "catch all" Law. Any web site that speaks out for the rights of the people, any site thats is educating people about the freedoms what Jefferson, Adams and their contemporaries believed in so much that they stood up and spoke out even under the threat of death, can be a target of this law. How can that be you say???
Easy...just let a child request additional information.
COPPA if it really wanted to protect children would have flatly stated what information can be obtained from children for the purposes of record keeping. Does it? No. If anything it is purposely vague about what can be asked and is riddled with loopholes. All the better in Congress' eyes for snuffing out "rabble rousers" on the web.
Keep an eye on COPPA. I gaurentee you, it WILL get employed in this way.
SELECT * FROM User WHERE Clue > 0
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Frankly, I can't think of a single, legitimate, non-sleazy reason to collect information from anyone under 13. How about giving kids a break from your demographic-analyzing targeted-marketing schemes, guys?
Next, you'll be calling them at home before school to tell them about your great new breakfast cereal. Give me a break.
Save the whales. Feed the hungry. Free the mallocs.
The legislation and rulemaking for COPPA was quite contentious, and the FTC is probably going to be much more of a stickler for children's privacy than it has been for Net fraud.
michael wrote that "We've already seen that the FTC refuses to investigate even large-scale privacy fraud on the part of Internet companies, so it seems extremely doubtful that they're going to deploy COPPA Vice Squads to go out and enforce compliance. Unless you're a really big company in really flagrant violation of the law, you have nothing to worry about."
But it's not quite that simple. Actually, the FTC has been conducting sweeps for Net fraud, and I expect they will start doing much the same thing for kiddie privacy. However, while fraud-hunting is challenging because you need to chase down elusive "businesses" that change online locations frequently, playing the sheriff for violations of children's privacy is easier: investigating and confirming violations are simpler since the FTC can go after established companies.
Also, FTC sweeps aside, COPPA may open the door for lots of lawsuits, perhaps even class-action suits. (Are your lawyers listening yet?)
COPPA ought to be taken very seriously, and many companies are scrambling to comply. (See, for instance, this C|NET article, Many Web sites will pay high price for children's data , or this Wired article, Time Running Out on Kid E-mail .)
Not complying by tonight is not a big deal. Not complying by early summer is a problem. If you don't have your act together by August, you're in serious trouble.
A. Keiper
The Center for the Study of Technology and Society
Washington, D.C.
You don't have to take all that information. You could have their parents fill out that information. It's not like a 9 year old is going to join a soccer league without his parents' knowledge and permission anyway.
Good point! I hate those d---ed registration sites anyway. If I have to "register" to get something, I usually don't and go somewhere else. Sites like that just lose my business.
I get worried when I see any internet Protection Act.
. The protect-anything-from-anybody-Protection Act.
The-protect-your-pet- parakeet-from-bad-bird-feed-Protection Act.
The protect-My-pants-from-hot-grits -Protection Act.
The protect-Cowboy-neal-from-natalie-portman-glam-shot s -Protection Act.
The protect-my-karma-from-AOL-moderators-Protection Act.
The protect-the-other-guy-from-himself-Protection Act.
The protect-yourself-from-yourself-Protection Act.
It seems that there is no end to the gov. trying to baby-sit us.
___
My site uses an Ultimate Bulletin Board - they've recently put out a copy that's COPPA compliant. Of course, the way they've done it isn't up to my standards... hehe... So what will my solution be? Simple: I'm turning off registration on my site until I can figure it out.
*: Not that I'm saying we shouldn't be trying to keep 'private' information out of the hands of people who would do harm to kids / Big Giant Evil Corporations / the Marketing Department...
Canada... where the internet is unregulated...
BlackNova Traders
Here's the design problem: As the poster pointed out, if you don't target your site at the under-13 crowd, and if you simply fail to ask the respondant's age, you don' hafta do nothin'. Well, that should be OK, right? After all, if you don't know their age, you lose one of the most important pieces of marketing information, and therefore you can't really use your nefarious marketing tactics on their impressionable little minds.
Unfortunately, wrong. The purpose of all those demographic studies is to find out what people in a certain group like to buy and what characteristics they have, but you can surely reverse those demographics to find out, given a set of characteristics, what age group they are in. Ask them a relatively few "key" questions scattered in with the rest of the form ("What's your favorite possession? a) car b) home c) pokemon cards") and you will know what market segment you are interviewing. Then the rest is buttah - you can collect their data with just as much (if not more) certainty that they actually are the age you believe them to be. After all, anyone can lie to a direct age question; but you may not realize someone is asking your age when they ask you about your favorite possession.
Oops. Back to the drawing board, lawmakers.
It's rare that you're presented with a knob whose only two positions are Make History and Flee Your Glorious Destiny.
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/targetting/ things to you. I looked at a bunch of Transformers auctions on Amazon.com, and all of a sudden when I go to Amazon.com I'm greeted with a list of Transformers auctions, books, movies, and such. Cool! Saves me some effort. I haven't paid much attention, but I'll bet the banner ads they show me are targeted at kids and toy-afficianados. :)
You have to consider what they *want* the information for. *WHY* do companies want demographic information about you? Once you understand this, it doesn't look nearly as scary.
My company for example, asks for all of the above plus (optionally) information about how much you make, your occupation, what industry you are in, and your precise address. Why?
It isn't as useful as one would think for "tracking" you. Even if you *don't* provide a site with that information, they can analyze their log files to see what people are doing (most log analyzers even list the "top paths through site") and of course, cookies can make even more precise tracking possible.
Companies don't care about *YOU* personally. There is nobody sitting at some desk somewhere saying "Aha! John Smith likes McDonalds!" Most uses of demographic information are *more effective* if you as an individual are ignored.
All demographic information is useful for is
There's really not as much to this as you think. It's simply an extension of customization. How many of you customize your Slashdot page to show the SlashBoxes you like? Well, that's the same thing: You're giving Slashdot demographic information about you. The fact that you're logging in lets them uniquely identify you.
Ok, so they can't identify you in meatspace, but so what if they could? Are the black helicopters going to land in your front yard? No. At *worst*, you might get a little more junk mail -- targetted to stuff you've shown you're interested in.
BFD.
There are abuses of privacy, and privacy does need to be protected, but many of you are too over-sensitive about this issue. You don't make a distinction between *good* and *bad* uses of personal information and you overlook the fact that most of you just throw such information at web companies without thinking twice about it.
MrJoy.com -- Because coding is FUN!
SO - Let's see. You don't like COPPA. Your choice. But what do you offer to those who need our protection - the kids? The internet is open - so is a library. But do you let your or anyone else's kids take out any book? Regardless of the medium, information not right for kids is not right. And if your 'rights' are impaired I ask which is more important? Yours of the kids? Let's move towards a goal, not impair any movement you happen to not like.
You shall know The TRUTH, and THE TRUTH will set you free.
Unless you're a really big company in really flagrant violation of the law, you have nothing to worry about.
Good, the last thing we need is government regulating every little thing on the internet. What are they going to do about foreign sites? Nothing, that's what. So this whole law is just a stupid little bone they can throw to say "look at what we are doing to ugh, Protect the Children". If a site wants to collect info, they just move offshore.
God forbid they actually do something that benefits children, like cut taxes or something.
DrLunch.com The site that tells you what's for lunch!
Would a guestbook count as collecting "personal information", as it asks for name, website, where you're from, etc.----or since it's hosted by Bravenet, do they take the heat? Even though all fields are optional (excepting name and comment, which can be easily lied to)?
How am I supposed to know if my site is directed towards people under 13? I'm sure there are plenty of adults out there that would be interested in it, though it is more child-like stuff.
I regret I can't give the site out here; the /. effect might kill it, since it's only a free site.
~~~LXT~~~
Life is like a computer program: anything that can't happen, will.
... is a difficult thing to prove. One possible solution is to discard any information on anyone who is less than 13 years of age. Not a hard algorith to do...
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ping -f 255.255.255.255 # if only
Not that it applies to many sites - most can brush this off. But the problem is that legislation like this gets it's foot in the door and then more regulation starts pouring through. They tried it first by saying that it was all these perverts who were online. Then they attacked crypto as being tools for "infocriminals". Now they're saying "It's for the children!", a cry that should sound an alarm for any activist who fears government regulation. Christ, don't these people just give up? I rather wish congress wasn't based on districts but was held at the national level - it would put an end to this sillyness.. but that's an entirely different discussion..
Regulation like this needs to be shot down - it will only open the door to more legislation, litigation, and regulation. I want as little of any of those as possible online.
If your site sells products for an age group under 14, or has reason to believe minors(as defined within' the scope of this law) are on your website then you need to comply. Selling pokeman, but not putting an age catagory in the signon, may not be enough to protect you. Since is perfectly reasonable too assume minors will visit your site.
On a humorous note:
about 2 weeks ago I logged on to NeverQuest, and they had a pop up that said, If you are under 13 you need to get parental permission. If you made a "mistake" entering your birthdate you should change it now.
Could you find a less obvious way to say "Lie to us so we won't be liable, or have to do too much extra work"
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on