Moving the United States into the 21st Century for Children's Online Privacy Rights

It has been more than twenty-five years since the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) was first implemented in the United States. Since its enactment—well over a decade ago—there has been only one instance in which Congress successfully passed noteworthy modifications to the Act. While there has been a recent increase in proposed amendments to the Act better to protect children in our current reality of everchanging technology, little has been done to initiate the much-needed change. The increased focus on children’s online rights has been sparked primarily by changes made in the United Kingdom. At the forefront of the drive for greater protection of the privacy rights of children, the United Kingdom’s transformation has left the world considering what alterations need to be made to their current systems to stay up to date with this growing demand. Despite the mounting need for change, online service providers have stalled the process, leaving children in a world of new technologies without adequate protections in place. As market giants, online service providers influence ongoing debates to limit legislative changes and the potential economic burden of those changes. Several scholarships have identified issues with the current system in the United States, but few have taken on the task of proposing a practical solution. To effectuate change, it is imperative to zero in on the most essential needs of children to adequately protect them online while balancing the concerns of those opposing large-scale modifications. This Note will begin by looking at the current law of child online privacy protections in the United States, COPPA, exploring how the act works, how violations are handled, and how the original version of COPPA has changed. Next, it will explore the approach recently taken by the United Kingdom and then evaluate how COPPA compares, as well as the discussions currently taking place regarding this topic. Lastly, this Note will set out a five-point plan to implement the necessary changes to bring children’s online privacy protections into the 21st century.