Site Seeing on the Internet......
Keeping our Children Safe.
The advent of the Internet —
with its new methods of communicating through websites,
electronic mail, news groups, chat rooms, electronic bulletin boards and commercial online
services — is a historic development that is impacting American culture as much as the
introduction of television or, a few generations earlier, the telephone. According to recent
survey evidence, 76 million American adults use the Internet. This figure represents a
marked increase from figures reported in recent years.
Children are avid consumers and represent a large and powerful segment of the marketplace. They also represent a large and rapidly growing segment of online consumers. Almost 10 million (14 percent) of America’s 69 million children are now online, with over 4 million accessing the Internet from school and 5.7 million from home. Their growing presence online, therefore, creates enormous opportunities for marketers to promote their products and services to an eager audience.
Using the Internet can be a rewarding experience for parents as well as children. But parents should know that websites collect a significant amount of personal information from children, such as the child’s name, postal and e-mail address, and favorite activities and products. This information can be collected by asking children to register with the site, join a kids’ club, enter a contest or complete a questionnaire online. Cartoon characters ask children to provide information or entice them to buy products.
Websites also collect personal information through means that are not obvious, such as using electronic means to track which pages a consumer views and for how long. As a result, merchants can effectively follow consumers around their “virtual stores” as consumers do their shopping.
The personal information collected is used to create customer lists. In some cases, these are sold to list brokers and advertisers. Sometimes this information is posted on the website in “guest books,” members’ profiles, chat rooms or on home pages hosted by a website. Posting such information may enable others to contact a child, possibly without the parents’ knowledge. Parents should be concerned not only about marketing to children, but the possibility that detailed personal information about their child could end up in the hands of people with more hostile intentions. All of this raises questions about privacy on the Internet.
In June 1998, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) issued a comprehensive report on Internet privacy. The report showed that the vast majority of sites collect personal information from consumers — 92 percent in the sample representing all U.S.-based commercial sites likely to be of interest to consumers. Eighty-nine percent of the 212 children’s sites surveyed collect personal information from children, but only one percent obtain parental permission prior to collecting such information. The survey also found that the vast majority of websites fail to provide even the most basic privacy protection — notice of what information they collect and what they do with that information.
The information practices of the sites designed for children were also disappointing. While 54 percent of children’s sites surveyed provide some form of disclosure of their information practices, few sites take any steps to provide for meaningful parental involvement in the process. Only 23 percent of sites even tell children to seek parental permission before providing personal information. Fewer still (7 percent) say they will notify parents of their information practices, and less than 10 percent provide for parental control over the collection and/or use of information from children.
Commission staff found numerous examples of inappropriate information collection practices, many of which were directed at children. For example, one child-directed site collects personal information, such as a child’s full name, postal address, e-mail address, gender and age. The website also asks a child extensive personal finance questions, such as whether a child has received gifts in the form of stocks, cash, savings bonds, mutual funds or certificates of deposit; who has given a child these gifts; whether a child puts monetary gifts into mutual funds, stocks or bonds; and whether a child’s parents own mutual funds. Elsewhere on the website, contest winners’ full names, age, city, state and zip code are posted.
Another child-directed site collects personal information to register for a chat room, including a child’s full name, e-mail address, city, state, gender, age and hobbies. The website has a lotto contest that asks for a child’s full name and e-mail address. Lotto contest winners’ full names are posted on the site. For children who wish to find an electronic pen pal, the site offers a bulletin board service that posts messages, including children’s e-mail addresses. While the website says it asks children to post messages if they are looking for a pen pal, in fact anyone of any age can visit this bulletin board and contact a child directly. Neither of these websites posted a privacy policy or asked children to get their parents’ permission before participating in such contests or surveys.
Recently, there have been some encouraging signs that the private sector is attempting to address consumer concerns about online privacy. A number of industry leaders have taken steps to develop self-regulatory programs, and website providers — particularly those with sites directed toward children — are taking steps to alleviate parental concerns by removing objectionable material or developing consent options.
The Commission feels strongly, however, that at the very least a basic level of privacy protection and a framework for rules governing the online collection of information from children should be mandated. Legislation covering these points is currently pending in the U.S. Congress. It would require commercial websites that collect personal identifying information from children 12 and under to provide actual notice to the parent and obtain parental consent. Where the personal identifying information is collected from children over 12, websites would be required to provide parents with notice of the collection of such information and an opportunity to remove the information from the site’s database.
In the meantime, the Commission has developed “Site-seeing on the Internet,” a guidebook to help parents talk with their children about surfing the web, including hints about what to look for. The guide offers the following advice to parents and educators about surfing the web with children:
David E. DeSantis serves as an advisor to Commissioner Mozelle Thompson at the Federal Trade Commission. Commissioner Thompson has a particular interest in privacy and the Internet, especially when it comes to children.
For more information on Internet privacy, surf over to the FTC’s own website, www.FTC.gov