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Children's Online Privacy Protection Act of 1998

The issue: The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) proposed regulations for implementing the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act of 1998 (COPPA). As proposed, these regulations would have had significant negative consequences for children's online publishers. Specifically, the regulations would have restricted our ability to provide interactive content for children and would have imposed burdens on parents and publishers through a cumbersome consent process.

Our position:

1. We understand that the FTC recognizes that determining how to achieve "verifiable parental consent" is difficult. We ask the FTC to be as flexible as possible and to strive to ensure that the requirements do not unduly harm the ability of publishers to provide materials to children and families through subscriptions and other means.
2. We ask the FTC to consider providing an exemption to consent, notice and opt-out requirements for letters to the editor and other non-commercially oriented submissions.
3. We oppose the requirement that privacy policies be visible at the top of a home page because website design is an important part of its appeal to children. This should not be construed as a lack of support for a requirement that privacy policies be accessibly displayed on a website.
4. We support a simple notice requirement that is not overly detailed and complex, so that children and parents can understand its intent.
5. We oppose the FTC's proposal to make the rules apply retroactively to information already collected.
6. We oppose expanding the interpretation of the Act to treat information "requested" online the same as information "collected" online.
7. We ask that the FTC include a more comprehensive definition of "parent" so that rules can be efficiently implemented. For example, given that millions of children live in non-traditional families, many schools have adopted policies that allow the release of information only to custodial parents.
8. We remain concerned that compliance with Section 312.6 (a) (3) will have the unintended consequence of putting personal information about children into the wrong hands regardless of the procedures established to properly identify parents requesting information about their child. This could potentially harm children, while exposing publishers to excessive liability.

Actions Taken:

1. 1999: AEP joined Kids in the Know (www.kidsintheknow.org), an alliance of education-related groups - associations and companies that make a difference by providing valuable information, services, and opportunities to parents and young people. This membership helped us get member issues concerning COPPA onto the FTC radar.
2. 1999: AEP submitted comments to the FTC concerning COPPA. (Read AEP’s comments.)
3. 2001: The FTC conducted an exclusive meeting with AEP executive director, Charlene Gaynor, and representatives from AEP member organizations. (Read the AEP Online article about the meeting.)

Outcome:

1. The issue many publishers saw as the greatest burden was laid to rest: The rule confirmed that schools can act on behalf of parents in granting permission to collect data from students. So instead of having to seek parental consent individually from each student who supplies an age or address, a publisher need only disclose once — to the school — what kind of data will be collected and how it will be used.
2. Effective April 21, 2002, the Federal Trade Commission has amended the Children's Online Privacy Protection Rule to extend the sliding scale time period. This means that website operators -- many of whom are educational providers -- may use an e-mail from a parent as verifiable parental consent for the collection of personal information from children under age 13. As long as the data collected is for the site's internal use only, the rule will apply for another three years.

AEP Online articles on COPPA.

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