Internet Security ABC - An Overview on COPPA Childrens Online Privacy Protection Act

An Overview on COPPA Childrens Online Privacy Protection Act

In light of the escalated acts of harassment, stalking and predatory acts on the internet against children, Congress passed what is called COPPA, the Childrens Online Privacy Protection Act. October of 1998 marked when this act was passed. Basically, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has the job of issuing and enforcing any rules regarding the privacy of children online.

The main objective of the Childrens Online Privacy Protection Act is to arm parents with the control over what data and other information is collected when their children are on the Internet or other online activities. Because the Internet is vast and dynamic, COPPA was created to be a solid yet adaptable rule to guard children.

This Childrens Online Privacy Protection Act pertains to owners of commercial

websites as well as those services provided online that caters to children under the age of thirteen. In addition, it also applies to websites with a general audience which collects information and knowingly acknowledge that some of their visitors are under thirteen years of age or younger. In these two instances, these website owners and webmasters must do several things to comply with COPPA:

1. Their Privacy Policies must be clearly indicated on their website. These policies must be all-encompassing and describe what their practices are in obtaining information from their websites visitors, especially when those visitors are children.

2. In those instances when personal information is going to be collected from children, these website owners and webmasters must present parents with the choice about whether to allow them to obtain information. Of course, this must be done BEFORE any information is actually collected.

3. Webmasters and website owners should give the parents the option to allow the collection of their childrens information as well as the use of it; however, the parent should also be able to prohibit the Webmaster or website owner from revealing the childrens information to other parties.

4. Parents would have the right to review any information that was collected from their children and have the option of deleting it.

5. The COPPA act would also present parents the chance to bar any further collection of information from or about their children from the webmaster or website owner.

6. Webmasters and/or the website owners must preserve the security, reliability and privacy of any information they obtain from children. In addition, they should not make providing more information a condition of participation than what is necessary to partake of an online activity.

COPPA applies to any place that operates based on the United States federal laws including the District of Columbia, the fifty United States and even the territories. One instance where the Childrens Online Privacy Protection Act does not apply is to most recognized non-profit organizations that are exempt under federal law.

In clarification, COPPA applies to a few types of information that are unique to each child like their full name, email address, home address, telephone numbers or any other means that could lead someone to contact a child through the internet. Additional information that applies to this privacy protection act includes a childs interests and any tracking information that could be obtained through IP addresses or cookies, but only when they apply to information unique to a child.

There are a lot of detractors of COPPA. Some say that it is almost impossible to reinforce because a lot is dependent on the parents policing their childrens Internet activities. And others, especially child-oriented sites, closed up shop online because they could not keep up or afford the paper chase associated with complying with this Childrens Online Privacy Protection Act. The bottom line is that the Internet is seemingly infinite and safeguards like COPPA can only help instead of hurt in the long run.

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