CIPA & COPPA

This week I learned about the Children’s Internet Protection Act (CIPA) and the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) more in depth. Both of these laws were created to protect students’ safety and privacy when using electronic devices in the classroom. CIPA ensures that the schools that receive government funding via E-rate provide filtering and monitoring softwares on their electronic devices to ensure student safety. These softwares block harmful and inappropriate content on school devices. CIPA also ensures that schools educate their students on internet safety. It is important for students to learn about being safe online, such as not talking to strangers, being truthful about their age when creating an account online, and never meeting up with strangers they met online. It is also important for students to learn about cyber bullying. COPPA is a federal law that protects the privacy of children under 13 years old by not collecting their personal information, such as their name, email, school information, and much more. This law gives parents full control of the personal information that is collected of their children younger than 13 years old. 

Image Source: Olusegun Edun's Prezi Presentation

I think CIPA and COPPA do enough to protect children. It is also the responsibility of the parents, teachers, and school staff to reinforce the students’ safety and privacy when using electronic devices. As a team we can work together to ensure our students are being responsible online and their personal information is being kept private. Parents can monitor their children’s online activity at home and they can also change their devices’ settings to ensure that they aren’t being on any inappropriate or malicious websites, as well as not creating accounts that aren’t meant for their age. Teachers and school staff can also create lessons to educate the students on what they should and shouldn’t do when using their electronic devices. Teachers and school staff can also closely monitor the students’ online activities. Google has widgets and add-ons that allow the educator to monitor their students’ screens and block websites too. During Covid, I remember many middle school teachers shared during our staff meetings that they used different widgets to monitor their students’ screens because they would often be on a different website than they should be during remote learning. 

I think CIPA/COPPA should target students younger than 13 years old. Students nowadays are very tech savvy and it’s important to ensure that their privacy and safety is secure when being online. I think danah boyd’s comment that COPPA teaches kids to lie is relevant because it is easy for children to lie about their age when creating different social media accounts. It is the parents responsibility to ensure that they are aware of their children’s online activity and to take all the necessary precautions to make sure that their children aren’t on websites they shouldn’t be on. 

The additional privacy laws for children are a good baseline to protect students’ personal information, safety, experience, and data when being online. The schools that abide by these laws understand the importance of keeping our students safe inside the classroom when using their electronic devices. Especially because we know the great benefits of students using the internet as an academic resource. It is the parents responsibility to continue to protect their children from home when using electronic devices.