Parents Want Strong Privacy Protections

Right now, the average American spends nearly seven hours online a day, with two and a half hours of that time being spent on social media platforms. That time nearly doubles for American teenagers, who spend on average 4.8 hours a day on social media platforms. 

All the while, companies are collecting nearly every data point imaginable to build profiles on our kids—which they use to feed algorithms specifically designed to keep them addicted to their platforms. Studies show that teens and young adults who spend more time on social media experience lower psychological well-being, lower life satisfaction, less happiness, more feelings of loneliness and isolation, and more depression. These algorithms intentionally target children with content that can lead to dangerous and life-threatening behaviors, like eating disorders and self-harm.  

Take for example, Ava Smithing, who recently testified before the Energy and Commerce Committee. Big Tech platforms collected and then weaponized Ava’s personal data—like her age, location, and gender—against her. According to Ava, “they used my data to infer what other types of ads and content I might ‘like,’ leading me down a pipeline from bikini ads, to exercise videos, to dieting tips, and finally to eating disorder content.”

By monitoring her post engagements and what she spent time viewing, social media companies could track and exploit Ava’s vulnerabilities. Ava said, “How was I—a 14-year-old child—supposed to understand that social media platforms would use my age, location, and gender to target me with advertisements designed to instill insecurity in me?” 

Ava’s story is one of many that is sadly heard too often.  

It’s time for the status quo to change, which is why we’re leading on the American Privacy Rights Act to put people back in control of their personal information online and strengthen online protections for kids.

As Energy and Commerce Committee Chair Cathy McMorris Rodgers has said, the American Privacy Rights Act (APRA), which includes provisions of the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), is foundational for protecting children online.

APRA protects kids online and makes it tougher for their data to land in the hands of Big Tech and bad actors by:

• Minimizing the data that is collected and retained on all Americans, including children, to what companies actually need to provide products and services
• Making it illegal to target advertising to children under 17 years old, and also allowing those over the age of 17 to opt-out of targeted advertisements
• Treating all data on children under the age of 17 as sensitive, meaning more robust protections for the collection and transfer of their personal information
• Requiring Big Tech to review their algorithms to ensure they do not endanger children through malicious content suggestions, stopping the downward spiral that exploits so many children online
• Creating a national data broker registry and a data broker “do not collect” and “delete my data” option for people
• Requiring companies to let people access, correct, delete, and export their data

We cannot continue down the path we’re on, where companies and bad actors are allowed to collect troves of our data—and our kids’ data—unchecked.  

CLICK HERE for coverage of how APRA establishes strong data privacy protections for people of every age in every state.

CLICK HERE to learn more about how APRA puts people in control of their data.

CLICK HERE for how APRA will help small businesses grow and thrive.