COPPA

Child Online Privacy Protection Act…COPPA!

In ECMP355, we get to discover all the different tools we can find online that we can integrate into our schools to help engage our students and create exciting, relevant lessons.  However, one thing we do not talk about are the things we need to be careful about-privacy.  In an elementary setting, we are working with a younger group of students, from ages 5-14.  If you remember when you signed up for Facebook (or really any other social media site), it asked if you were over the age of 13.  Why 13?  Because, according to COPPA, this is the age that divides types of protection for children online.

COPPA is US legislation that sets out the regulations for websites dealing with personal information of children under 13 online.  They are not allowed to have any personal information posted online for those children.  While this is an American law, and technically does not apply to any other country, the social media sites we use are from the states, so use that as the rule.  It is in their ToS, so anyone on that site has to follow it, regardless of country.

I read a blog post that was very well written a few months ago, with research done by a mother with a 12 year old daughter who was making the decision to let her daughter go on Facebook or not (unfortunately, I cannot find the post again, but I am searching!).  She found out a lot of information that stopped her from letting her daughter on Facebook.

1. Under 13s cannot have their personal information online (name, birthday, location, occupation, likes, anything)
2. Privacy settings for 13-18 year olds are automatic, and the information is under lock and key-only their friends can see anything that they do
3. Advertisements cannot be shown on the pages of 13-18 year olds
4. Once children turn 18 years old, their privacy settings become open

The crux of this is, once the child “turns 18” on Facebook (even though they may only be 16, because they joined at 11), they are treated as an adult, and all of the privacy measures on their accounts go (visibility, advertisements).  That is not good.  And illegal.

This is something that I think that needs to be talked about to us as we learn about integrating technology into our classrooms, because it does need to be brought to our attention, because in Canada, we simply don’t know about it (or, at least I didn’t.)

For instance, last week I was at the school where I did my pre-internship, and I was excited to see a big bulletin board with the big Twitter “t” on it.  The 7/8 classes were all using Twitter in their social studies classes.  I thought this was really cool-they are using what we talk about in school.  There were print-outs of Tweets that the students had sent on the board, and it looked really good.  Unfortunately, there are some students who should not be on Twitter, because they are only 12.  I assume that the teachers don’t know about the laws, otherwise it wouldn’t have been done.

 

In conclusion, there is a lot that we need to learn about the other, more serious side of incorporating technology into our classrooms, and make sure that what we are doing complies with COPPA and the ToS of the sites we use.  I would love more information on what people do or know about the privacy laws, so please comment.