After a two-year comment process, the Federal Trade Commission
adopted its long-awaited amendments to the Children's Online
Privacy Protection Rule in December 2012. The amendments, which go
into effect July 1, 2013, clarify, supplement and revise the Rule
issued under the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act
(COPPA) in many areas, and have particularly important implications
for mobile application developers, advertising networks and social
networking services.
COPPA imposes notice and verifiable parental consent
requirements on the operators of websites or online services that
are directed toward children under the age of 13 or for operators
who have actual knowledge they are collecting or storing
"personal information" from children under the age of 13.
Operators are prohibited from conditioning a child's
participation in an activity upon disclosure of unnecessary
personal information and required to take reasonable steps to
secure any personal information
