Facebook's rules are clear. If you're under 13, you can't have an account. CEO Mark Zuckerberg wishes it weren't so, but the rule still stands because COPPA (the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act) bans websites from collecting information from those under 13.
Apparently this is a rule made to be broken. A recent survey by MinorMonitor found that plenty of children under 13 are Facebook members, and an appreciable number of tots 6 and under have Facebook accounts.
The survey specifically aimed at parents of children who are 18 or under and who use Facebook. Survey Sampling International gathered data from 1,000 parents using an online questionnaire.
Kindergartners Online
If everyone followed the rules, the age distribution of children in the sample would have been 100 percent in the 13 to 18 range. In real-world results, 19 percent fell in the 11 to 12 range and another 19 percent were 10 or younger. Four percent of the children in the study were six years old or younger. Click the image below to see the full infographic.
MinorMonitor's report extrapolates an alarming result from this survey. Consumer Reports data from last year identified 20 million active Facebook users under 18. If the survey's percentages hold across this sample, "that translates to 800,000 kindergartners on Facebook."
Of course, the parents themselves may actually be managing some of these accounts, adding status posts as-if from baby dearest. An earlier study by AVG found that five percent of children under two had social network accounts created by parents.
Parental Concerns
Asked about 11 safety worries, 74 percent of parents admitted concern over their children's safety on Facebook. 56 percent expressed worry about online contact with sexual predators, far more than other categories.
Over half the parents polled monitor the child's Facebook account by logging into it with the username and password. (Mom or Dad telling junior to turn over his password isn't quite the same as employers making the same demand of job applicants). A quarter of them figure they can keep track by "friending" the child. 17 percent don't monitor the child's activities at all; we can hope those are the oldest kids.
Essential Action Items
The report concludes with these sensible action items for parents:
- Know passwords and other login information, and teach your children not to share their passwords or personal information.
- Keep Facebook profiles set to private, and know Facebook's other built-in safety features.
- Teach children about "friending" and that all requests from strangers should be declined.
- Remind children that information posted online is public.
Parents can also install a tool like MinorMonitor, which keeps track of the child's Facebook activity and sends alerts for potential problems. MinorMonitor also offers a pair of handy guides to Parental Controls and Facebook Safety for Kids.
Parents are clearly willing to ignore Facebook's 13-year minimum age. Those online kindergartners really, really need protection and guidance. Parents; do your job!
For more from Neil, follow him on Twitter @neiljrubenking.
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