To protect the image rights of children on the Internet, the National Assembly has just voted on a bill allowing the “digital authority” to be withdrawn from parents who abuse publications on social networks.
For the Secretary of State for Children Charlotte Caubel“today, a parent can no longer avoid thinking about digital technology in the exercise of parental authority”. However, even though they are not old enough to know how to play a keyboard or use a smartphone, children find themselves exposed to social networks and inherit, from the start of their lives, a serious passive on the Internet, which could be harmful to them later. Whether through scenes intended to make people laugh, influencers who use their family life to make money or simply photos posted on Facebook to show the family that the youngest is doing well, Exposure on the Internet is not without consequences and children’s image rights are rarely respected.
Faced with these increasingly common practices which can prove dangerous, the National Assembly adopted on Tuesday October 10 in new reading – the lower house and the Senate had not managed to agree on this text – a proposal for law aimed at making parents responsible and better protecting children’s image rights in the face of certain abuses, as reported AFP. Supported by MP Bruno Studer (Renaissance) and supported by the Government, it is part of a set of texts aimed at protecting children from the dangers of social networks, in particular with the establishment of the digital majority at 15 years for networks social (see our article). In particular, it introduces the notion of the child’s “private life” into the definition of parental authority in the civil code. As a result, the child has a right to his or her image which is exercised jointly by both parents, taking into account the child’s opinion.
Children’s image rights: preventing dangers and educational violence
Children, even before they are old enough to surf the Web, are particularly exposed to the Internet. According to figures cited by parliamentarians and the executive, a child “appears on average in 1,300 photographs published online before the age of 13, on his own accounts, those of his parents or those close to him”. While parents must respect the privacy and privacy of their children a study by the Observatory of Parenthood and Digital Education (Open) published at the beginning of February reports that 53% of French parents have already shared content about their children, and 43% of them started as soon as the child was born.
Sometimes things go further than a simple photo of a birthday party shared with friends. In the race for views and likes, parents do not hesitate to reproduce “trends” on social networks by staging or playing “pranks” on their offspring. So, on TikTok – again and again – the “Cheese Challenge” was in vogue for a while. Videos where adults have fun throwing a slice of cheese at the little one’s face and filming him crying and struggling as best he can to remove it have been viewed millions of times. The “child police” is also very successful: the parent broadcasts the recording of a fake police officer who claims to come to pick up the child because he is not good – and of course, the child is generally in tears , which makes Internet users laugh. “These practices are similar to digital educational violence, even though we fought to eliminate spanking and other humiliating practices”Thomas Rohmer, president of the Observatory of Parenthood and Digital Education, was indignant last March. In addition, the children appearing in the photos or videos often find themselves in improbable or humiliating situations, they can subsequently be the target of cyberharassment.
The bill passed by the National Assembly provides that the minor’s right to image be exercised jointly by both parents, taking into account the opinion of the child. If there is disagreement between the parents, the judge can prohibit one of them from “to publish or distribute any content without the authorization of the other”. In the event of serious harm to the dignity or moral integrity of the child, “the individual, the establishment or the departmental child welfare service which has taken in the child or a member of the family may also apply to the judge for the purpose of having the exercise of the right to ‘image of the child” specifies the text. A sort of forfeiture of “digital parental authority” whose aim is to “empower parents” while showing minors that “parents do not have absolute rights over their image”, to use the words of Bruno Studer. During the new reading, the deputies adopted against the advice of the Government an amendment from the ecologist Jérémie Iordanoff in order to “allow the National Commission for Information Technology and Liberties (CNIL) to take legal action to request any measure necessary to safeguard the rights of minors in the event of non-execution and absence of response to a request for deletion of personal data”.
Children on social networks: the business of influencers
The new law aims to extend that of 2020 aimed at regulating the schedules and income of minors whose image is broadcast on the platforms. Because yes, who says social networks, says influencers. Thus, according to the Open study, 85% of parent influencers publish photos/videos of their children at least once a week, and 38% at least once a day. Only 44% of them say they obtain their child’s consent before posting content about them – but they still need to understand everything that this entails. Some people make their children the center of their business, and it’s not just a small appearance from time to time. They do not hesitate to depict their family life in vlogs – video blogs – in order to generate maximum advertising revenue or to practice unboxing – the adult films while the child unboxes toys or various products to promote them. Moreover, 47% of influencer parents say that this activity has become their only source of income.
For the biggest accounts or YouTube channels, the rate is enormous, sometimes with several videos per day. Among the best known on YouTube, we can cite Swan & Néo (more than 6 million subscribers, created in 2015) and Studio Bubble Tea (nearly 2 million subscribers). And this is not without consequences for children. Still according to the Open study, 60% of parent influencers say that it takes up to an hour to prepare and that two to ten takes are necessary before publication. Here again, only 42% say they do not encroach on the rest, homework or leisure time of their offspring for the production of content. Unfortunately, not everyone is aware of the law of October 2020, according to which parents who distribute the image of a child under 16 years old on a video sharing platform must request authorization or approval from administration. In addition, part of the income received must be placed in the Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations until the child reaches the age of majority or is emancipated. However, 33% of influencer parents are unaware of the existence of this legal framework…
Last February, influencer Poupette Kenza was placed in police custody in a criminal investigation into “facts qualified as evasion by the parent of a minor child without legitimate reason from their legal obligations compromising their health, safety, morality or education”, after Internet users accused her of overexposing her children on social networks. Earlier in January, influencer Jessica Thivenin also received a stream of criticism for making her 3-year-old son believe she was touching his face with feces.
Children on social networks: the dangers of child crime
One of the problems of the Internet, apart from the fact that all posted content remains on the Web for years, is that publications can quickly escape all control and be diverted from their initial, completely innocent purpose. Thus, Bruno Studer reveals that “50% of the photos exchanged on child pornography forums were initially published by parents on their social networks. Certain images, notably photos of naked babies or young girls in gymnastics outfits, are of particular interest to child crime circles”.
In 2018, The Rat Kinga YouTuber specializing in Internet abuses, had investigated and identified a network of Internet users who shared thousands of YouTube videos of children practicing gymnastics. “As soon as we see a split, a leotard, nudity, the videos of these children, which very rarely exceed a hundred views, generate several thousand, even several hundred thousand views”, explained the YouTuber. By following the trail of these videos, he arrived on a video sharing network for pedophiles. And this is just one example among many… It is therefore more essential than ever to make parents aware of the dangers of digital technology and to take the necessary precautions (see our article). And, if a family photo is published, it is better to put a sticker on the child’s face or completely blur it (see our practical sheet)!