Online shopping cart Home | 'Can I see some ID?' Why age verification is a hot topic for online retailers (Part 1)

'Can I see some ID?' Why age verification is a hot topic for online retailers (Part 1)

24 June 2009

In the first of a two-part look at age verification issues facing online retailers and dangers faced by children in the virtual world, we consider age verification legislation, why it is a hot topic, and tools that retailers can use.

Much is made of the perception that we live in a risk-averse culture, and parents have never been more aware of the dangers - real or imagined - faced by their children in the real world.

But what about the dangers facing children in the virtual world? 

Parents - the so-called Web 1.0 Generation - know there are risks when using the internet:  grown-ups who use it to prey on children, adult content, cyber-bullying, and illegal sales of age-restricted products to name but a few.

Little wonder many of them feel powerless to protect their children from the risks posed by technology their kids have a far better grasp of. 

Age verification legislation

Against this backdrop, a Private Member's Bill introduced by MP Margaret Moran requiring online retailers to verify the age of customers buying age-restricted goods or services has recently had its second hearing in the House of Lords.

The Bill requires online retailers to take ‘all reasonable steps' to avoid selling age-restricted products to those underage. It also requires annual advice from government to retailers setting out what constitutes ‘all reasonable steps'. 

More worryingly, it contains a provision that would allow the Bill - if enacted - to apply to non age-restricted goods or services; for example online content which has a more subjective, harmful, element to it, such as suicide websites or social networking sites.

It is the second time the Bill has been introduced, and in both cases appears to have been met with the same view: its purpose and intention is laudable, but the practicalities of implementation and enforcement are probably unfeasible.

The Government's position in direct response to the Bill appears to remain unchanged.  Under-age sales are illegal, whether the sale happens online or not. The priority remains to enforce the existing laws. This position, together with both Jacqui Smith's recent announcement not to provide any further additional funding to the Police Central e-Crime Unit and Margaret Moran's expenses scandal resignation, seemed to be a clear indication that the Bill would not proceed much further.

However, in its consultation on amendments to the Licensing Act 2003, a key recommendation was the introduction of an obligation for online alcohol retailers to implement a ‘robust' age verification procedure. The Bill may not go much further, but the issue of online age verification and internet access is unlikely to go away. 

So what's all the fuss about?

The concept of verifying a purchaser's age in the sale of restricted goods and services is not unusual.

Alcohol, knives, cigarettes and films are just a few of the examples of age-restricted products.  Retailers have various means available to help verify the age of the purchaser in face-to-face transactions; the difficulty is how to do it online.

For authorities, testing age verification by online retailers is becoming more prevalent.  Greenwich and Brent local authorities have run online underage test purchasing campaigns with alarming results.

Children as young as 13 were able to buy knives from online retailers with few or no age checks.

In other countries, moves have already been made towards restricting access to certain sites for youngsters, either in respect of age-restricted goods and services, or more generally for social networking sites.

In the USA, the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act 1998 (COPPA) requires that all websites aimed at children and which collect children's data must obtain verifiable parental consent before collecting any personal data if the child is under 13.

Verifiable consent involves writing to or otherwise communicating with the child's parents before collecting any data. Moves followed to further limit website access for children under the Child Online Protection Act 1998 (COPA) were also introduced, aimed at stopping sites knowingly making available to children material deemed harmful to minors.

Ten years later, COPA has been deemed unconstitutional without ever having taken legal effect due to consistent legal challenge. The court found that the definition of ‘harmful' content was simply too subjective, and conflicted with the USA's enshrined right to free speech. 

Australia and Canada also have legislation in place relating to age verification. In Australia, the Communications Legislation Amendment (Content Services) Act of 2007 requires anyone who provides commercial content online - or to mobile phones - to take steps to ensure the content is not accessed by children.

The legislation relates to either adult content, which is currently illegal, or age-rated content. A user's age has to be evidenced by provision of the user's full name, together with either a credit card or a digitally certified signature.

In Germany, a number of social networking sites agreed to adhere to a code of conduct created by a voluntary self-regulating body, including online retailers (FSM). 

The code of conduct seeks to protect children's data and privacy by implementing technical measures, for example security settings for under-14s, providing clearly written privacy policies, and not targeting children with advertising unless they have agreed to this.

The German Parliament recently went a step further, bringing in new legislation requiring internet service providers to restrict access to sites named on filtering lists supplied by the German Federal Police containing inappropriate images of children.

The new law means that internet services providers will be obliged to put technical measures in place to stop internet users from accessing any sites on the list. It is likely that the law will be challenged on civil liberties and data protection grounds, but is indicative of the gravity with which access to online products and services is now viewed. 

Tools for retailers

Verifying age is easier for some products than for others.

For physical goods that are to be delivered, getting the delivery company to verify the purchaser's age before handing the goods over - as when alcohol is sold as part of online groceries - is a simple solution for retailers. 

Verification becomes much harder for online goods and services. In these cases, age verification has two aspects:

There are a host of products available to online retailers to help with the first question. 

Companies offer a database cross-checking service, which checks information provided by a purchaser against existing databases, such as the electoral roll, phone directory, passport and DVLA registers.

This often happens in real-time, so purchasers may not even know the check is running.  Additional layers of verification can be added, including telephone checks and questions based on information in the database, for example ‘What car were you driving in 1982?', or ‘Who were your neighbours in 1975?'. This type of database age verification is now a necessity for online gaming providers under the Gaming Act 2005.

Another age-verification technique has been a requirement for potential purchasers to register their credit card with the online retailer. However, the advent of credit cards for under-18s means credit cards are no longer an indicator of age.

Although some credit card companies are happy to insert age-related information into their card numbers, this usually attracts a fee and is a discretionary measure only. And it fails to deal with children who use a parent's credit card and/or account to access age-restricted services. 

Retailers have other tools to weed out underage users.

Some website owners offer an ‘incentive' to children to be honest about their age by applying a maximum age limit on those who can enter sites. This may be useful for sites aimed specifically at children, but is of little help for sites trying to avoid children accessing them, or in identifying adults posing as children.

Phrase searching, where key ‘youth' phrases are monitored - and users rejected if they sound too young - is available, but has limited effectiveness.

More common is software requiring children to input their age or date of birth on a site, and if when the age entered is below the minimum required a permanent or temporary cookie is placed on their machine, preventing any future access.

This approach is common in the USA following COPPA, and has resulted in www.coppakids.com, a blog on which outraged tweenies blocked for being too young complain about why they should be allowed to email Miley Cyrus and Zac Ephron...even though they're only 12.

View the second part of this article

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