FTC Extends Comment Deadline for Revisions to COPPA

As we mentioned in June, the FTC is currently reviewing its Rule relating to the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) to determine if it adequately protects children given the rapid changes in technology and the way children use and access the Internet, for example, through use of mobile phones, Twitter, interactive games and other new media. The Commission announced that due to a technical glitch it is extending the deadline for submission of comments to July 12.

So far, 45 entities have submitted comments including a coalition of child advocacy, health, consumer, and privacy groups that is urging the FTC to update the COPPA Rule by:

• Extending COPPA to mobile phones, online gaming consoles, interactive television, and other new digital platforms “that are used by marketers to track and target children”
• Revising the definition of personal information “to reflect contemporary marketing practices in which persistent cookies, IP addresses, geo-location data, and even seemingly anonymous combinations of data such as age, zip code, and gender can be used to identify and target individuals”
• Revising when and how a website can contact children without obtaining parental consent, and “investigate whether some marketers are circumventing COPPA’s intent by using this exception to the rules to engage in ongoing data collection and personalized marketing”
• Developing a separate set of privacy protections for children 13 and older. 

• Expand the list of parental consent methods to offer more “consumer-friendly, effective and scalable mechanisms”
• Clarify that website operators can avoid the “collection” or “disclosure” of personal information by using robust, automated filtering systems which will “enable operators to offer interactive activities to children in privacy-enhancing, safe, and cost-effective ways”
• Affirm that the COPPA Rule does not apply to “local communications” and is limited to the Internet
• Refrain from expanding the definition of personal information to include persistent IP addresses, online behavioral advertising, or user or screen names which “would result in negative and unintended consequences for consumers”.

Numerous individuals have also posted their personal beliefs regarding the proposed Rule. Interested parties may continue to submit comments electronically by using the following link http://www.ftc.gov/os/comments/copparulerev2010/index.shtm, or in paper form mailed and delivered to the FTC, Office of the Secretary, Room H-135 (Annex E), 600 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W., Washington, DC 20580.