The Federal Trade Commission recently announced its agenda for its upcoming workshop: The Future of the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA). The Children's Advertising Review Unit (CARU) was thrilled that its director, Dona J. Fraser was invited to speak on a panel about such an important topic. CARU is not only a safe harbor provider under COPPA but it was the first program to be deemed with the honor.

The COPPA Workshop will be held on October 7, 2019, at the Constitution Center, 400 7th St., SW, Washington, DC, and is free and open to anyone who wishes to join.  For those not in the area, the event will be webcast live via the FTC's website.

About the COPPA Workshop

The Future of the COPPA Rule: An FTC Workshop will examine whether to update the COPPA Rule in light of evolving business practices in the online children’s marketplace, including the increased use of Internet of Things devices, social media, educational technology, and general audience platforms hosting third-party child-directed content. The COPPA Rule, which was enacted in 2000 and updated in 2013, requires certain Web site operators to obtain parental consent before collecting, using, or disclosing personal information from children under 13. Workshop topics will include:

How the development of new technologies or business models, the evolving nature of privacy harms, and changes in the way parents and children use websites and online services, affect children’s privacy today;

How the Rule should address parental consent for education technology vendors that collect personal information consented to by schools, following on discussions that occurred during the FTC’s Student Privacy and Ed Tech workshop in December 2017;

Whether the Rule should include a specific exception to parental consent for audio files containing a child's voice that website operators collect and then promptly delete;

Whether the Rule should permit general audience platforms to rebut the presumption that all users of child-directed content are children, and if so, under what circumstances;

Whether the revisions to the Rule made in 2013 have worked as intended or require modification; and

Whether the Rule should be amended to better address websites and online services that do not include traditionally child-oriented activities, but that have large numbers of child users.

For a more detailed list of topics, see the Commission’s request for public comment on the COPPA Rule.

About the CARU COPPA Safe Harbor Program

CARU, an investigative division of the advertising industry’s system of self-regulation, has two missions: (1) to protect children from deceptive or inappropriate advertising in all media, and; (2) to ensure that, in an online environment, children’s data is collected and handled in a responsible manner. CARU works with companies to ensure their advertising and data collection practices comply with all relevant laws and CARU’s self-regulatory guidelines, which take into account the uniquely impressionable and vulnerable child audience.

As an extension of its mission to help companies comply with COPPA and properly address the collection and retention of children’s data in an online environment, CARU established its COPPA Safe Harbor Program to provide guidance to companies on how best to comply with COPPA and the CARU Guidelines. Program participants who adhere to CARU’s Guidelines are deemed in compliance with COPPA and essentially insulated from enforcement actions by the FTC.

Visit us online to learn more about CARU's COPPA Safe Harbor Program and learn more about what services are offered.