Laws & Policy
Verifiable parental consent
The process a service uses to confirm that a real parent has approved collecting their child's personal information, as COPPA requires for kids under 13.
- Businesses
- Parents
This is general information, not legal advice.
What parents should know
Verifiable parental consent means the company has to check that a parent, not the child, said yes before it collects personal information from a child under 13. A checkbox the child can tap is not that check. COPPA is the law that requires it. This page is general information, not legal advice.
On this page
What is verifiable parental consent?
The Children's Online Privacy Protection Act tells operators to get verifiable parental consent before collecting, using, or sharing personal information from a child under 13, with limited exceptions. The consent has to be reasonably calculated, in light of available technology, to make sure the person giving it is the child's parent.
The FTC has described several methods that can meet that test, including a signed form, a monetary transaction, a toll-free call staffed by trained people, a video conference, and a government-ID check, among others. The right method depends on how the data will be used. A method that only asks the child to type a birthday is not verifiable parental consent.
Why verifiable parental consent matters
Kids can open a general chatbot in a minute. If the account belongs to the child, you may never see the chat, and the company may never have asked you. Consent is the moment the parent becomes the account holder, or at least the person who approved the collection.
Teens 13 and older are outside this COPPA duty. A product can still ask a parent to create the account for a 15-year-old. That is a design choice, not the same legal checkbox. Read which age the consent screen is actually for.
How it shows up in practice
- A child under 13 tries to sign up and the service stops until a parent completes a check the child cannot finish alone.
- A parent is asked for a card, an ID, a signed form, or a live confirmation, not only an email the child controls.
- A teen product skips that step because COPPA's duty is aimed at under 13, and the parent asks what replaces it.
- A school, not a parent at the kitchen table, is the one approving a student tool, which is a different process from home consent.
How HeyOtto helps
On HeyOtto, the parent creates the account. A child does not self-enroll. Under 13, setup asks for verifiable parental consent. The parent can read the chats after the account exists. There are no ads, kids' chats are not sold, and conversations are not used to train models.
- The child does not hold the parent settings or the consent step.
- HeyOtto for Schools is a separate deployment, with its own adult viewers.
- This describes the product. It is not a legal opinion that every consent method fits every service.
For families
Try freeFAQs
Is a birthday gate verifiable parental consent?
No. Asking a child to enter a birth date does not show that a parent approved anything. COPPA's test is whether the method is reasonably calculated to reach the parent. A child who can pass the screen alone has not produced parental consent.
Does this apply to my 14-year-old?
Current COPPA is aimed at children under 13. A 14-year-old is outside that consent duty unless another law or the product's own rules say otherwise. You can still choose a product where you create the account and can read the chats. COPPA 2.0 would change some of this, and it is not law.
What methods does the FTC accept?
The FTC's COPPA guidance lists several, including a signed consent form, a credit or debit card transaction, a toll-free number, video verification, and government-ID checks. Which one fits depends on the data use. Read the FTC FAQ before you treat one method as the only method. This is general information, not legal advice.
Who consents when the school assigns the tool?
Schools sometimes consent for educational uses of student data, under conditions the FTC describes. That is not the same as a parent signing up at home. Ask the school what was approved, who can see prompts, and whether the vendor may use them to train a model.
Sources
Last reviewed September 26, 2026. Law entries are reviewed every quarter.
This is general information, not legal advice.