All in the Data Family: Children's Privacy Online

Author

John Lawford

Organization

Public Interest Advocacy Centre (PIAC)

Published

2008

Summary

This paper reviews the privacy risks posed to children when commercial entities begin targeting children through their personal information on the Internet. Children’s websites overwhelmingly expose their private information without their informed consent or that of a parent or guardian, under the guise of joining or enjoying websites that are designed to be online playgrounds. The paper is informed by a qualitative research study performed with young volunteers aged 11-17 in a controlled computer laboratory environment in Toronto, Canada, in which they were allowed to engage in any Internet activity. This paper concludes that the current legislative privacy framework in Canada and the important effect of limited privacy laws in the United States is inadequate to protect children’s online privacy to a standard that is appropriate. As a result, this report recommends that Canadian privacy law, and chiefly the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA) be amended to add specific rules in relation to the protection of children’s privacy. First, there should be a general prohibition on the collection, use and disclosure of all personal information from children under the age of 13. Second, for young teens aged 13-15, websites should be permitted to collect and use personal information, with the consent of the teen and the explicit consent of a parent for the benefit of the child and solely in relation to that website or service and should not be permitted to further disclose their personal information. Third, for older teens aged 16 to legal majority (18 or 19), websites should be permitted to collect and use personal information, with the consent of the teen. Such websites should be permitted to disclose the personal information of the teen only with the opt-in consent of the teen and explicit consent of a parent. Any website undertaking such collection and using such personal information should demonstrably conform to all present requirements of Canadian privacy law, in addition to these new age restrictions. The Report also makes several recommendations involving increasing the readability and simplicity of privacy notices for children and adults; adoption of a privacy rating system that is simple and has graphical representations of privacy threat levels; better education of children and parents in online privacy protection and rights.

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OCA Funded Research
This research received funding support through the Office of Consumer Affairs' Contributions Program.

Contact information

Source: Consumer Policy Research Database