Antitrust Law Daily Wrap Up, TOP STORY: Proposed parental consent method under COPPA rule out for comment, (Aug 16, 2013)

By Jeffrey May, J.D.

The FTC is seeking public comment on a proposed new method for obtaining verifiable parental consent for purposes of complying with the Children's Online Privacy Protection Rule.

Under the rule, issued pursuant to the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), online sites and services directed at children must obtain permission from a child’s parents, prior to collecting, using, or disclosing personal information from children under the age of 13. While the rule enumerates a number of acceptable methods for gaining parental consent, the FTC will consider new verifiable parental consent methods. AssertID, Inc., has submitted an application for Commission approval of such a method, and the Commission is seeking feedback on the proposal until September 20, 2013.

AssertID describes itself as a private for-profit corporation specializing in the development of proprietary privacy and identity verification technologies, products and services which leverage advances in the science of Social Network Analysis. AssertID intends to use its core identity-verification technology to offer a new web-service (“ConsentID”) that "remove[s] significant impediments to COPPA compliance faced by operators while at the same time empowering parents with the tools and information they need to manage their children’s online privacy," according to the application.

AssertID explains that its core identity-verification service allows participating users to create a digital identity credential (an “AssertID”), which contains the user’s self-asserted identity attributes as provided by the user. Once created, a user’s AssertID becomes available for verification by a select group.

ConsentID is intended to ensure that the individual granting parental consent is in fact the parent of the child, as the rule requires. The application describes the six processes that would be used to obtain verifiable parental consent:

(1) a process for parental notification of consent-request;

(2) a process of presentment of consent-request direct notices to parents;

(3) a process for recording and reporting a parent’s response to a consent-request to the Operator;

(4) a process for recording and reporting a parent’s request to revoke consent previously granted and to have their child’s personal information deleted;

(5) a process of verification of the parent-child relationship; and

(6) a process to ensure that only a parent of the child for whom consent is being requested can access and respond to such requests.

In its request for comments, the FTC said that it was particularly interested in receiving comment on the following issues:

(1) whether this method is already covered by existing methods;

(2) whether the proposed parental consent method is reasonably calculated, in light of available technology, to ensure that the person providing consent is the child’s parent; and

(3) whether the proposed method poses a risk to consumers’ personal information.

Comments can be filed online at: https://ftcpublic.commentworks.com/ftc/copparuleassertidapp. Alternatively, comments, identified as “AssertID Application for Parental Consent Method, Project No. P-135415,” can be submitted to: Federal Trade Commission, Office of the Secretary, Room H-113 (Annex E), 600 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW, Washington, DC 20580.

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