Sec. 2. Findings

599 words·~3 min read·/bill/113/s/1700/is/section-2

A research copy — for the controlling text, always check the official state or federal source. Not legal advice.

Congress finds the following: Since the enactment of the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act of 1998, the World Wide Web has changed dramatically, with the creation of tens of millions of websites, the proliferation of entirely new media platforms, and the emergence of a diverse ecosystem of services, devices, and applications that enable users to connect wirelessly within an online environment without being tethered to a desktop computer. The explosive growth of the Internet ecosystem has unleashed a wide array of opportunities to learn, communicate, participate in civic life, access entertainment, and engage in commerce.

In addition to these significant benefits, the Internet also presents challenges, particularly with respect to the efforts of entities to track the online activities of children and minors and to collect, use, and disclose personal information about them, including their geolocation, for commercial purposes. Children and teens are visiting numerous companies’ websites, and marketers are using multimedia games, online quizzes, and mobile phone and tablet applications to create ties to children and teens.

According to a study by the Wall Street Journal in 2010, websites directed to children and teens were more likely to use cookies and other tracking tools than sites directed to a general audience. This study examined 50 popular websites for children and teens in the United States and found that these 50 sites placed 4,123 cookies, beacons, and other tracking tools on the test computer used for the study. This is 30 percent greater than the number of such tracking tools that were placed on the test computer in a similar study of the 50 overall most popular websites in the United States, which are generally directed to adults.

Children and teens lack the cognitive ability to distinguish advertising from program content and to understand that the purpose of advertising is to persuade them, making them unable to activate the defenses on which adults rely. Children and teens are less able than adults to understand the potential long-term consequences of having their information available to third parties, including advertisers, and other individuals. According to Common Sense Media and the Center for Digital Democracy, 90 percent of teens have used some form of social media, 75 percent have a social networking site, and 51 percent check their social networking site at least once a day.

Ninety-one percent of parents and 91 percent of adults believe it is not okay for advertisers to collect information about a child’s location from that child’s mobile phone. Ninety-four percent of parents and 91 percent of adults agree that advertisers should receive the parent’s permission before putting tracking software on a child’s computer. Ninety-six percent of parents and 94 percent of adults expressed disapproval when asked if it is okay for a website to ask children for personal information about their friends .

Eighty-eight percent of parents would support a law that requires search engines and social networking sites to get users’ permission before using their personal information. A Commonsense Media/Zogby poll found that 94 percent of parents and 94 percent of adults believe individuals should have the ability to request the deletion, after a specific period of time, of all of their personal information held by an online search engine, social networking site, or marketing company.

According to a Pew/Berkman Center poll, 69 percent of parents of teens who engage in online activity are concerned about how that activity might affect their children’s future academic or employment opportunities. Eighty-one percent of parents of teens who engage in online activity say they are concerned about how much information advertisers can learn about their children’s online activity.