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Discussion: Please consider creating children's accounts
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children
COPPA
family
kids
limited
minors
parent
permission
private
restricted
under-13
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 tangledmanes |
Please consider creating children's accounts
Sep 17 2008, 11:29 PM EDT Allow restricted accounts for minors with verifiable parental permission. Minors would not be allowed to create sites, but could participate in sites approved by a parent. Even if minor accounts were limited to private wikis, it would allow children in far-flung military families, and others, to interact online. This could be done with restricted accounts for which WetPaint would not collect information, in compliance with COPPA. There must be a way to do this, or sites like ePets & Disney would be in violation. Perhaps an invitation could be set up that allows the minor recipient to sign up only for the WetPaint wiki to which they are invited... As your linked FBI file says, "There are dangers in every part of our society. By educating your children to these dangers and taking appropriate steps to protect them, they can benefit from the wealth of information now available on-line." What better way to introduce children to this wealth of information than by guided interaction on wikis? Thanks for your consideration! Do you find this valuable? |
 Jason_wetpaint |
RE: Please consider creating children's accounts
Sep 18 2008, 1:13 AM EDT ePets seems to avoid the issue entirely. Nowhere on their site is date of birth required. I would say they're skating on thin ice. Disney, of course, is extreme in their handling of children's privacy, as the law requires. The part of the Disney Kid's Privacy Policy that sticks out to me is: "Before allowing a kid to use a feature of our Web sites that might result in the public disclosure of the kid's information to third parties on the Internet, such as posting on open message boards, we require a high level of verification to confirm that the parent has given permission for the kid's participation in such features. For example, we may require a parent to provide us credit card information, speak to a trained telephone operator or return by postal mail or fax a signed consent form." Wetpaint is a big forum. We would need to verify that the adult in question is actually the parent of the child wishing to sign up. We would then need to keep and archive that proof and the proof of their permission. Disney is a big company with thousands of employees and can afford to spend the money to maintain a staff to do this verification. Disney's business is kids, so it makes sense for them to do so. Wetpaint is a small startup company, with less than 50 employees. I would love to be able to open up Wetpaint to people of all ages. I believe that our collaboration tools can be beneficial to everyone. Unfortunately, the privacy laws of the US prevent us from being able to do so without a huge expenditure which would not make sense for us. 1 out of 1 found this valuable. Do you? |
