TeenAge Privacy Program
Helping U.S. companies collect and manage teenage data responsibly.
It is no secret that teens are voracious users of technology. What may be less apparent, at least to them, is that their quest for greater engagement threatens the safety of their personal data. Teens are a unique demographic with unique concerns related to their personal data, but without specific standards to bridge the gap between childhood and adulthood.
To assist any business engaging with teen consumers, the TeenAge Privacy Program (TAPP) maps the broad spectrum of potential privacy and online safety harms impacting teens onto a concrete set of operational considerations.
The TAPP Roadmap
Due to the heightened potential of risks and harms to teenage consumers, CISR convened business leaders representing consumer goods, children’s marketing, and wireless and media technology to develop the TAPP Roadmap, an operational framework designed to help companies develop digital products and services that consider and respond to these risks and harms and to ensure that businesses collect and manage teen data responsibly.
Organizations of any size can use this framework as a roadmap of considerations to help address the privacy, autonomy, and safety of teens.
The 2.0 Roadmap has been updated to align with new state laws, setting a robust standard for what companies should be obligated to do when ensuring teen safety online.
Laying the Foundation
In October 2020, BBB National Programs conducted a study that found that 82 percent of teen apps were ad-supported compared to only 52 percent of general apps. With 83 percent of mobile device users aged 13-17 downloading a new app at least once a month, that risk increases twelvefold. To protect teen privacy interests, some lawmakers propose raising the protected age range under the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) to include teens. In addition, the PROTECT Kids Act, the Kids PRIVCY Act, and the KIDS Act each apply certain concepts from COPPA to children under the ages of 16 or 17.
The intention is worthy, but the specifics come up short. Defining a website, app, or platform as a “teen space” is much more complex than identifying child-directed content, and the unique teen audience is strikingly different than COPPA’s current targeted age range of under 13. Teens occupy an intermediate space between childhood and adulthood, which demands a nuanced approach to setting new standards, not merely changing the age limit under COPPA.
The Environment
For companies looking to provide services to the teen market, the constriction of privacy protections and misapplied solutions looms. A 2019 Cisco Consumer Privacy Study showed that 87 percent of companies are experiencing sales delays caused by their customers’ privacy concerns. This number will likely rise as a plethora of digital privacy laws, including the California Privacy Rights Act (CPRA), take effect. Meanwhile, the call for increased regulation is accelerating, despite a lack of understanding around long-term consequences of hasty regulatory action.
In this environment, constant adaptation is the rule. The potential for online teen risk is accelerating as technology advances faster than any legislation can address. And, with legislation often arriving with unintended impediments to growth and innovation, informed solutions will be vital.
83%
of U.S. mobile device owners ages 13 to 17 downloaded an app at least once a month*
81%
of teens use social media with 70% saying they use it multiple times a day, up from 34% in 2012*
72%
of teens believe that tech companies manipulate users to spend more time on devices*
89%
of teens have their own smartphone, more than doubling since 2012*
*See sources cited in Risky Business: The Current State of Teen Privacy in the Android App Marketplace
Learn More
To meet with the TAPP team to learn how the TAPP Roadmap can be applied to your privacy practices, complete the form below.