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I'm a bit disheartened to see that everyone is buying the COPPA bullshit. Yes, COPPA is the law that applies, and has some restrictions. But that doesn't force

by ajays 15y ago

I'm a bit disheartened to see that everyone is buying the COPPA bullshit. Yes, COPPA is the law that applies, and has some restrictions. But that doesn't force Google to act like a total dick about it! Lets assume there's an automated process for detecting underage accounts. Why can't they just prevent the account from being used to send email? Or why can't they say "Sorry, we have to disable your account; but you can download all of your emails at (insert some secure link to a ZIP file)"?? Or, as the post says, migrate these accounts to their COPPA-compliant set of accounts? You know what the real problem is? The real problem is that Google collects a shit-load of data about its users. And they don't want to put in filters which will not log the data of underage children, because that opens them up to scrutiny. So they would rather keep this blackbox closed, and in the process if a few kids get screwed, then, well, screw 'em!

adgar 15y ago
> Lets assume there's an automated process for detecting underage accounts. Why can't they just prevent the account from being used to send email? Any data collection is forbidden by COPPA without parental verification. You seem to think that's just logging ad targeting data or something. No, it includes any information entered by the child into the service. So not only can they not send any email, they can't receive e-mail. They can't even have an email address! They can't thumbs up a video on youtube, let alone save one as a favorite video for later. You could only view google docs that are globally-viewable, since you can't share a private document with a child without storing some data about them. They certainly can't edit a document! It goes on and on.
- okoni 15y ago
  everything you mentioned seems to me to be ad targeting data, email, email address, thumbs up, save as fav even viewing a global google docs all this is part of data collected as part of the profiling process in order to do ad targeting. Actually I don't think there is a single you do once logged on (or registered) that is not collected to profile you. facebook even collects what you do when logged off.

by ajays 15y ago

adgar 15y ago

> Lets assume there's an automated process for detecting underage accounts. Why can't they just prevent the account from being used to send email? Any data collection is forbidden by COPPA without parental verification. You seem to think that's just logging ad targeting data or something. No, it includes any information entered by the child into the service. So not only can they not send any email, they can't receive e-mail. They can't even have an email address! They can't thumbs up a video on youtube, let alone save one as a favorite video for later. You could only view google docs that are globally-viewable, since you can't share a private document with a child without storing some data about them. They certainly can't edit a document! It goes on and on.

okoni 15y ago
everything you mentioned seems to me to be ad targeting data, email, email address, thumbs up, save as fav even viewing a global google docs all this is part of data collected as part of the profiling process in order to do ad targeting. Actually I don't think there is a single you do once logged on (or registered) that is not collected to profile you. facebook even collects what you do when logged off.