The other day, I was watching a bunch of solo jazz dance tutorial YouTube videos and adding them to a playlist for a student organization I’m an officer for (Swing Dance Club! Come check it out next semester!) when I was suddenly informed by a popup that I couldn’t add a certain video to a playlist because it had been marked as a video for children, and there are new rules about childrens’ content on YouTube. I guess one of the rules is “no playlists”? I was thrown off for several reasons. Firstly, the video wasn’t for children- I mean, there wasn’t anything explicitly adult about it, but it was a tutorial for a choreographed jazz routine first developed a hundred years ago. Is this the content toddlers want to see?

As I considered the playlist restriction, it sort of made sense. YouTube channels creating and curating borderline-nonsensical childrens’ content is a prime method of “ad-farming” (creating low-effort content for the sole method of earning advertising revenue) on the platform.  Secondly, childrens’ content and adult or frightening content might be mixed in a playlist, whether intentionally to scare children or for other purposes. These are the reasons I could think of. I suppose the platform prefers video order is selected carefully by the user, or by the trusted autoplay algorithm.

However, I decided to look into the law referenced in the notification, which is called the Children’s Online Privacy and Protection Act, or COPPA for short. It was originally enacted in 1998, but recent changes have caused the new sorts of online developments I had run into. The main, broad goals of the law include that children’s online tools, websites, and content for children under the age of 13 must have a “clear and comprehensive” privacy policy, keep children’s data secure, and provide notice and obtain parental consent (likely in the form of a “I agree to…” checkbox) before collecting information about children. Schools may also grant broad consent in place of parents on educational websites used solely for education purposes. It was the first Internet-specific privacy law passed in the US, so it’s an important piece of technological legislature history.

I’m sure many of us have cherished childhood memories of checking a box that says something like “By checking this box, I certify that I am at least 13 years of age.” Those sorts of statements when using a website are probably to ensure the website is not responsible for any of the specific restrictions of COPPA.

I looked to YouTube’s blog to find clarification of their response to the recent changes. The viewers of videos deemed “children’s content” (by either the creator of the content or the machine-learning algorithm) are now considered children regardless of the actual age of the user account watching the video. This now disables some functions, such as comments, notifications, targeted advertising (because of decreased data collection), and, apparently, sharing to playlists.

There are people (primarily content creators, on both sides of the ad-farming divide) that are unhappy with these changes. One flaw of COPPa many of them point out is the monetary danger for individuals: civil penalties can go up to $42,530 per violation.

So what exactly are we protecting children from? Primarily, data collection. What sort of data collection? The present Internet might look different from the one in 1998, but, currently, it seems to mainly be advertisers who collect the most user data of the sort COPPA restricts. This prevents some predatory targeted advertising practices that prey on children’s taste and possible lack of understanding of online commerce. In a situation like YouTube content, it’s less clear. There’s no targeted advertising, sure, but blocking actions like commenting seems to suggest a desire to keep children from viewing content deemed age-inappropriate.

Does it work? Well, it’s easy to get around by simply making sure your content isn’t labelled as children’s content. We saw this in the age of “I certify that I am at least 13 years of age”, and we are going to continue to see it as all sorts of online content creators try to avoid COPPA restrictions. On the user’s side, it’s fairly easy for a child to mindlessly check a box and escape into the full adult world of non-privacy-protection. As to keeping “inappropriate” content away from children, again, it’s pretty easy to click a box or simply click away into a non-COPPA-protected video or website. The measures seem slightly performative, considering how easy it is to get around them if desired, but I suppose every step towards keeping uncomfortable or unsafe content from appearing unwanted in front of a child is a good one. What, however, are the specifics of the sorts of content children under the age of thirteen should not be allowed to see? Is it morally right to restrict created content this way, and would it be right if platforms were to take further steps to keep children from ever seeing content they deemed “inappropriate”?

These are the censorship questions fueling many content creators’ rage about COPPA. The Federal Communications Commission, on the other hand, withholds the essential nature of this particular law in its current state. (The FCC came to widespread attention a few years ago when they repealed US net neutrality rules. Recently, they released a tone-deaf memo implying that the repeal of these rules was essential in order to aid broadcasters in providing aid in the midst of the coronavirus epidemic. I don’t get it either.)

Hopefully this has been an informative primer on the basics of children’s internet privacy in the US, and the ethical questions that continue to be debated, from the floor of Congress to your local Internet forum. The rights and protection of vulnerable groups have always been a matter of civic importance, and keeping an eye on how these issues are transformed on the Internet is an imperative of the modern civically engaged denizen.

Sources used in this blog post:

https://www.commonsense.org/education/articles/what-is-coppa

https://youtube.googleblog.com/2019/09/an-update-on-kids.html?visit_id=637213075436729775-1034442179&hl=en&rd=1