Personal information (PII)

People say PII for personally identifiable information. The exact legal list depends on the statute. COPPA's definition, in 15 U.S.C. § 6501 and the FTC rule, includes a name, address, social security number, online contact, a telephone number, and a persistent identifier that can be used to recognize a user over time. It also includes a photograph, video, or audio file that contains a child's image or voice. Geolocation is in the rule as well. A chat that says the child's name and school is personal information even if nobody uploaded a file.

General state privacy laws use similar ideas and sometimes add browsing data. Do not assume one definition covers every statute. For a child under 13, start with COPPA. For a student education record, also read FERPA. They are different laws.

Families under-share the obvious and over-share the quiet identifiers. A voice note, a face in a project, and a device ID are easy to forget. If a service is directed at children under 13, collection of that information generally needs verifiable parental consent, with the exceptions the rule actually lists.

HeyOtto's parent account is part of how consent and visibility work. Under 13, setup asks for verifiable parental consent. This page does not call that a government certification.

Personal information is anything that can identify a person, including a name, a school, or a photo in a chat. A parent creates the HeyOtto account and can read those chats. Chats are not sold and are not used to train other models. A public project link waits for parent approval.

• Parents can read the chats.
• Topic limits and tool permissions are per child.
• Under 13, verifiable parental consent is part of setup.