08 Dec New bill provides protection for children and adolescents in digital environments
By Eduarda Mourad Baldavira and Fabio Alonso Vieira
In October 2022, Senator Alessandro Vieira (PSDB), presented Bill No. 2.628 (“Bill”), whose main premise is to guarantee protection for children and adolescents in digital environments.
To reach its purpose, the Bill points out that the use of informational technology products or services by children and adolescents should respect the following principles:
a) the guarantee of integral protection;
b) the absolute prevalence of their interests;
c) the peculiar condition of a person in biopsychic development;
d) safety from intimidation, exploitation, abuse, threats and other forms of violence;
e) respect for the autonomy and progressive development of the individual;
f) protection against improper commercial exploration.
The Bill also includes significant references to the Brazilian General Data Protection Law (“LGPD”), so that Internet applications must provide information to parents, guardians, children, and adolescents, with independent access to the purchase of the product, about the risks and safety measures adopted for this audience, including privacy and data protection, in compliance with the provisions of §4 of Art. 14 of the LGPD:
“Art. 14. The processing of personal data belonging to children and adolescents shall be done in their best interest, pursuant to this article and specific legislation.
§4 Controllers shall not condition the participation of data subjects, as referred to in §1 of this article, to games, internet applications or other activities for providing personal information beyond what is strictly necessary for the activity.”
Also, in the event of data processing of children and adolescents, especially when performed for purposes other than those strictly necessary for the operation of the product or service, the controller must (i) map the risks and make efforts to mitigate them; and (ii) prepare a personal data protection impact report to be shared at the request of the National Data Protection Authority.
The rules introduced shall apply to digital applications, platforms, products and services and include:
i. Creation of mechanisms to verify the users age – the minimum age to create an account is 13 years old;
ii. Elaboration of semiannual reporting on the channels and amount of complaints for accounts with more than one million underage users;
iii. Banning “loot boxes” as they are considered gambling – these are sealed boxes that give random items to help the player and can be bought with game-specific coins, earned through various criteria, or bought with real Money;
iv. Advertisements directed to children should cease the use of childish language, excessive use of infant colors and music;
v. Advertisements directed to adolescents should in no way encourage offense or discrimination of any kind, nor induce feelings of inferiority in adolescents or encourage illegal activities, violence, or degradation of the environment.
If the Bill is approved, failure to comply with the mentioned rules may lead to suspension and banning of the service, as well as a fine of up to 10% of the company’s revenues in the previous year, or a fine of R$10 to R$1,000 per registered user of the provider, limited, in total, to R$50 million per infraction.
The amounts of the fines applied will be destined to the Fund for the Defense of Diffuse Rights for application in policies and projects for the protection of children and adolescents in the digital environment
Considering that technology is already a part of society’s daily life and, if used correctly, can bring countless benefits to the development of children and adolescents, it is not viable to prohibit the use of technological devices for this specific audience.
Therefore, the existence of a legislation that regulates and establishes limits for the digital environment is essential to ensure the safety of children and adolescents.
The Bill is still under consideration by the Federal Senate Plenary and can be fully accessed here.
This article is intended exclusively to provide information and does not contain any opinion, recommendation or legal advice from KV Advogados in relation to the matters herein addressed. Copyrights are reserved to Kestener & Vieira Advogados.
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