Parents are the firewall
Published 5:07 pm Thursday, August 2, 2012
It’s mostly accepted these days that “online privacy” is a contradictory concept, like “government intelligence” or “jumbo shrimp.”
Arriving a little late to the no-privacy party is the Federal Trade Commission, which on Wednesday proposed stricter online guidelines aimed at “making mobile devices safer for children to use and at barring third-party advertising networks and websites from collecting information on children without their parents’ consent,” USA Today reported.
The proposal is the latest update to the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act of 1998, which details steps websites must take to protect those under age 13.
Unfortunately, the FTC can update the act all it wants, but the problem begins with the fact that children can, and do, visit websites, with or without parental permission, and fib about their age. That’s how they have Facebook accounts, or set them up in someone else’s name.
The FTC proposal seeks to clarify that an ad network or plug-in, such as a Facebook’s “Like” button, and smartphone app makers must have parental consent before data can be collected about children under age 13.
Unfortunately, not all parents realize data is being collected about them, or their children, all the time. Adults have no such privacy protections from being followed online; it’s hard to imagine how it can be effectively, selectively applied to children under 13. Especially since that age group is such a desired demographic for advertisers.
(On the other hand, maybe adults could claim to be 10 years old and get the internet eyes off their every keystroke for a while.)
Meanwhile, it turns out Facebook has 83 million illegitimate accounts, give or take a few. That’s out of 955 million active accounts. And it’s just one site. Granted, it is the biggest social networking site. (Regardless of reports about its stock.) But Facebook’s immensity, which is a fraction of the internet’s immensity, highlights the David and Goliath-ness of the FTC’s battle to “protect privacy.”
“Verifying” a person’s age on any given website is a “honor system” matter of the user clicking a box, which is how children get around that particular hurdle. And online advertisers aren’t the only, or even biggest, privacy concern out there.
A recent poll found nearly 30 percent of U.S. teenagers are sexting, sending nude photos via email or text, Reuters reported. Those polled were between the ages of 14 and 19.
In reality, it’s truly only parents and guardians who are in a position to monitor and protect their tweens and teens from themselves, and the spying, advertising eyes, online.
