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With the Federal Trade Commission considering tightening the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act, two reporters debate whether or not children under 13 should be required to obtain parental consent before signing up for Facebook.
Facebook should not implement a minimum age for Facebook use
By Daffany Chan
Like freedom of speech and religion, the freedom to communicate should be a right of every citizen, regardless of age. With the expansion of technology, the Internet has become a global network linking people and markets together, and calls for unrestricted Internet access. The 1998 Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, however, prohibits youth under thirteen from using Facebook. Presently, the Federal Trade Commission is considering a new restriction to require parental consent before Websites can gather marketing data from children when “liking” products on Facebook. However, kids under thirteen should not be prevented from using social networking sites like Facebook and should not have additional restrictions.
Facebook is an important educational tool that can benefit children’s understanding of technology. Instead of trying to shield kids from the realities of our very technological society, kids should be allowed to use the site at an early age so that they can develop Internet safety skills that will make them more aware of how to handle the potential dangers of the Internet.
Although many parents cite frequent cyber bullying on sites like Facebook as a reason to prevent kids under thirteen from using the site, trying to block kids from using the Internet for social networking will not solve the bullying problem. For one thing, it is ineffective — there are many other forums on the Internet where kids have the capability to torment their peers, such as Instant Messaging. The problem needs to be fixed from the root by examining the reasons behind why children bully their peers. This includes raising bullying awareness at schools as well as increased parental involvement.
Legally prohibiting Facebook for young adolescents does not prevent them from using it, in fact, it may even increase the site’s appeal. The 1998 Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act currently bars kids under thirteen from Facebook, yet many lie about their age. Youth will find alternative ways to join Facebook, leaving them without the supervision of their in-the-dark parents. Without their parents’ counsel, they will be left even more vulnerable to cyber bullying and marketing tactics, thus negating the Act’s purpose.
Children’s safety is of concern to Facebook, which already has multiple safety features in place. These include systems to flag and eliminate child pornography; a partnership with Amber Alert — a tracking system for missing children; and relationships with school boards to help reduce cyber bullying, according to an Oct. 12, 2011 article in the New York Times.
Parents, not the government, should be responsible for monitoring their children’s Internet use, because the decision is best based on the child’s capability, not age. After all, the government cannot truly regulate the Internet use of young people. Parents are willing to help their children communicate via Facebook anyway, in fact more than three-fourths of parents stated that they would help their children lie on Facebook in order to use the site for educational benefits, according to a Nov. 8 New York Times article.
Many people fear the Internet’s lack of privacy. However, our society is moving towards technology, and while the Internet can have risky elements, it is ultimately beneficial for connecting us with people around the world. “In the future, software and technology will enable people to learn a lot from their fellow students,” Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said at this year’s NewVenture education summit, according to a CNN article. We should not prevent the future generation from using a tool that will only grow in the future.
Facebook's 13-year-old age requirement protects minors, increases safety
By Natalia Arguello-Inglis
In this digital era, the social-networking site Facebook has a home in millions of bookmark bars around the world. However, 7.5 million of the 20 million minors who actively used Facebook last year were under the age of 13, and 5 million were under the age of 10. Though a valuable tool for connecting with people, Facebook’s benefits have an age limit. Children under 13 are not capable of understanding the dangers and responsibilities that come with Facebook, and federal regulation should be tightened, not dismissed, to provide maximum safety to children using the web.
Those 7.5 million minors under the age of 13 violate Facebook’s online policy, which prevents anyone under 13 from legally signing up. However, by accessing the site under fake birth dates, pre-teens have skirted around both Facebook policy and federal law. The Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, passed by the Federal Trade Commission in 2000, prohibits Websites to take personal information from children under 13 without verifiable parental consent.
Though Facebook was originally designed for college students, founder Mark Zuckerberg said that he would like to see children under 13 legally join his social-networking site, according to a May 20 CNN Money article. Though he has not clearly stated so, Zuckerberg’s opposition to COPPA’s restriction may have something to do with the fact that Facebook generated $500 million in income from advertising during the first half of 2011, according to a Sept. 7 Huffington Post article. Losing 7.5 million users may cost Facebook millions, and Zuckerberg claims that his battle with COPPA is “a fight that will be taken on at some point,” according to CNN Money. Zuckerberg’s perceived motives have sparked debate with lobbyists and concerned parents who consider children’s online safety more important than revenue.
Facebook’s ability to track its users and share their personal information with advertisers and third-party developers jeopardizes the legal protection of minors. The site takes an exorbitant amount of personal information from its members — age, location, their friends’ “likes,” etc. — and shares it with advertisers and third-party developers. Additionally, Facebook embeds cookies in its members’ Internet browsers, which, along with benefiting users by helping recover spammed or hacked accounts, can track members’ online activity outside of Facebook and can continue to do so even after the user has logged out, according to a Sept. 28 CBC News article. Such information can be used by Facebook to tailor ads to a minor’s specific interests. This kind of advertising is troublesome as it can be used to build brand loyalty in children early in their development as a consumer.
According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, children under eight years are cognitively and psychologically defenseless against advertising that targets youth because they lack understanding of the advertiser’s intent, sales, and will accept claims as the absolute truth. Tightening COPPA’s regulations would in fact be beneficial to younger Internet users because it provides legal protection from the money-driven advertising industry.
Facebook is a minefield of online mistakes for children who are not as Internet savvy as older, more experienced Internet users. According to consumerreports.org, only 10 percent of parents of children under age ten speak with their children about appropriate online behavior. Facebook’s page may provide children with the idea that Internet use can be taken lightly, when in reality, Facebook is all about breaking down the wall between public and private — once something is shared on the Internet, there is no promise it will ever be able to be completely deleted, hence a simple misjudgment can become permanent. The site does have privacy options to limit who has access to user information, but according to consumerreports.org, 66 percent of active ADULT users either did not know that the options existed or did not know how to access them. If adults cannot decipher how to protect their private information through Facebook’s privacy options, how can we expect children to?
Furthermore, some online mistakes can cause harm to minors, as Facebook can act as portal for cyberbullying. As the site grows, so does the amount of cyberbullying it may provoke. According to the Cyberbullying Research Center’s 2004-2010 study, about half of young people have experienced cyberbullying — which includes stalking and harassment — and 10 to 20 percent experience it regularly. As a possible gateway for cyberbullying, Facebook endangers younger users who may not understand what constitutes as cyberbullying, both in impact and legal punishment.
Another prominent issue is sexual predators. Through Facebook and other sites, sexual predators have the opportunity to prey on child users. The site’s terms of service explicitly state that no convicted sex offenders can join, but just as children under 13 have demonstrated, sex offenders can and have gained access to the site under fake names and profile pictures. A May 9, 2011 Fox article reported that on several occasions, pedophiles have taken pictures of children from parent’s photos and other public albums. Though Facebook does make an effort to purge itself of sexual offenders — it removed more than 5,500 sex offenders in 2009, according to a Feb. 20, 2009 Associated Press article — it is impossible to keep all sex offenders from targeting child users. The only way to truly keep children under 13 safe is to keep those naïve minors from signing up altogether.
Facebook is a very useful tool, but for their own good, children under 13 should not be able to use it. When put in the wrong hands, it may harm more than it helps.
A version of this article first appeared in the Dec. 8, 2011 print edition of The Lowell.
Illustrations by Hoi Leung
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