Parental Control Software Datamines Kids' Online Conversations

An AP report reveals that web-monitoring software from Sentry and FamilySafe, both developed by EchoMetrix Inc., is harvesting data from kids' online chats, trying to determine their opinions on games, movies, and music. The data is then sold to other companies for advertising purposes. "In June, EchoMetrix unveiled a separate data-mining service called Pulse that taps into the data gathered by Sentry software to give businesses a glimpse of youth chatter online. While other services read publicly available teen chatter, Pulse also can read private chats. It gathers information from instant messages, blogs, social networking sites, forums and chat rooms. ... Parents who don't want the company to share their child's information to businesses can check a box to opt out. But that option can be found only by visiting the company's Web site, accessible through a control panel that appears after the program has been installed. It was not in the agreement contained in the Sentry Total Home Protection program The Associated Press downloaded and installed Friday."

Comments

Do I smell a lawsuit?

[El Jynx]

Yup, I think I do, yesss preciousss. Filthy nasssty antiprivacccccy dataminersessss! OUR precioussss!

Re:Do I smell a lawsuit?

[Khyber]

"Im sure there was something deep down in the fine print that will derail a suit."

Bullshit. When parents find out their children are being used for profit-making without their consent, not only is it going to be a shitstorm but it just might get COPPA reinstated.
Never underestimate the backlash of millions of pissed off parents. Many of them will do absolutely psychotic things to defend their children from any perceived threat.

That is what you get

[nurb432]

When you delegate your parental responsibilities.

Re:That is what you get

[tinkertim]

When you delegate your parental responsibilities.

As a parent of a three year old girl, I agree with you. However, standing over their shoulder the entire time they use a computer is not going to be very productive.

I wish more parents would understand that you have about 8 years from the time that a kid is born to install a sense of confidence and worth in them that can't be easily (if at all) broken by future peers, predators or come what may. If you manage to do it, your kid will make good choices.

No software is a substitute for a desire in a child to make good, positive self serving choices when they are confronted with the various bumps in growing up.

What a world this police state is becoming, sheesh.

Re:That is what you get

[Shadow of Eternity]

The problem isn't the kids, the problem is that some (probably uncomfortably large) percentage of parents absolutely refuse to consider their children as anything other than half employee and half property. You raise your kids to never know privacy, dignity, or respect and unless they are particularly unique in some way that shakes them free of the pattern they'll be doormats to anyone that wants to violate them in a similar way.

It doesn't help that we're the country that has no problem with flooding our kids with violence but god help us if they might possibly see a nipple somewhere, let alone anything else, and so parents will fall over themselves to pay various companies god knows how much for every knee-jerk reaction they can wring out of them.

Re:That is what you get

[quanticle]

There's a reason these stereotypes exist. Its because, in a large number of cases, they're actually true. If nothing else, the success of these companies proves that. The success of "Think of the children!" legislation proves it too.

No one in power is standing up to the parents of America and saying, "Hey, the reason your kids are fat and emotionally maladjusted is because you're too scared to let them go out on their own and make their own decisions." So, its up to people like us to make that point and hammer away at it until it sinks in.

Destroying childrens privacy in order to save them

[russotto]

Part of me wants to give a big Nelson ha-ha to the overprotective parents who install this crap trying to save their children from the eeeevil people on the Internet. Is it really any surprise that the corporations most interested in "protecting" your children are those who have figured out a way to exploit them?

Sue them.

[Yvanhoe]

Seriously. EULA or not, this is invading the children privacies. There must be a law against this.

Re:Sue them.

[Twanfox]

I seem to recall there being a law stating that no information may be collected from a under 13 years of age. It's called the Child Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA). I don't know much more about what the software is asking, and whom it is asking, but it seems to me they're treading dangerous ground by doing this kind of thing.

Re:Sue them.

[selven]

The child didn't agree to the EULA.

Sounds Illegal to me

[Concern]

In the US, children have special privacy protections afforded by law. It involves things like "opt-in" and parental consent.

http://www.coppa.org/comply.htm

IANAL, but I have worked on a number of projects which had to comply. Based on what is said here, this seems in flagrant violation. Somebody call the cops.

Highly Vauable Information

[gsslay]

Early results indicate that kids are pre-occupied with gayness (in an unfocussed and confused way), wedgies, noogies and the smell of poo.

Further analysis reveals that Disney actors are hot, teachers aren't and swimming pools are responsible for most diseases.

Any company data-mining this further are welcome to try. There are great truths to be found within, I'm sure.

Re:Highly Vauable Information

[Anonymous Coward]

Early results indicate that kids are pre-occupied with gayness (in an unfocussed and confused way)

Well, to be fair, so is the entire Republican party.

...Further analysis reveals that Disney actors are hot, teachers aren't and swimming pools are responsible for most diseases.

Don't be silly. Cooties are responsible for most illnesses. Boys get 'em from kissing girls. But, of course, only kids who are totally gay would be kissing girls. Ick!

Of course, once you get above the 9-year-old demographic, the scientific consensus changes.

Wonderful ...

[krou]

FamilySafe: Protecting your kids, but not from us!

Scare tactics

[redelm]

Well, what did you expect? Blocking software is basically an outgrowth of monitoring / usage software primarily developed for targetted marketing. So of course it monitors, the better build its' database.

Of course the kids have privacy rights, but as minors cannot exercise these which the parents/guardians have a fiduciary duty to exercise. The parents doubtless click agreement when the software is installed.

The real problem is that parents are scared into agreement by media overhyping low probability events and omitting crucial explanations / causes. So the parents hear: "Your kids could be another Columbine or victim" to sell whatever schlock they're peddling. Non-sequitur but the data is obscured.

A bigger question is why people like being scared. Adrenline rush? Most TV news runs that way. I never understood the popularity of horror flicks.

Proprietary software is evil

[Omnifarious]

One thing I always tell people is that people who won't show you the source code to their software have something to hide. It's almost certain their software is doing something that benefits themselves at your expense. Sovereignty over your own possessions requires that you insist on visible source code, even if you can't understand it yourself.

Re:Cue lawsuits

[couchslug]

"Cue lawsuits as the wife starts getting targeted advertisements for 'hot sluts in your area' due to the husbands chatting habits..."

Cue divorces as husbands start getting targeted advertisements for 'hot sluts in your area' displaying their wives.

Not apparently illegal [Re:Sounds Illegal to me]

[Geoffrey.landis]

In the US, children have special privacy protections afforded by law. It involves things like "opt-in" and parental consent.

http://www.coppa.org/comply.htm

IANAL, but I have worked on a number of projects which had to comply. Based on what is said here, this seems in flagrant violation. Somebody call the cops.

Nope.

"The Children's Online Privacy Protection Act and Rule apply to individually identifiable information about a child"

As long as they're only data mining the information on what the kids are interested in, and not saving which child was interested in what, they're apparently not violating the COPPA law.

Which is not to say that what they're doing is right, of course.

Technology is a tool, not a substitute

[Temujin_12]

My wife and I view our responsibility as parents as very basic:

1) Provide basic necessities an enjoyments of life (emphasis on necessities)
2) Provide love and a feeling of trust and safety in the home
3) Teach them a strong sense of identity and self-worth
4) Teach our kids what choices are, how to recognize good from bad choices, and how to accept the consequences of you actions

For computers, here's our strategy:

1) Place computers in a open public place (including our own)
2) Teach them that computers are a tool and how people use it for good and bad
3) Openly discuss what acceptable and unacceptable behavior with computers/games are
4) Limit time spent on computer
5) As much as possible, don't create double standards
6) Use OpenDNS and block certain sites depending on their age

We feel parental technology should be used to reinforce what you're already teaching, not as a substitute.

Re:Unsafe at any SPEED

[Dreadneck]

Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? -- Juvenal