Talk Radio News Service: News, Politics, Media

By Sofia Sanchez University of New Mexico/Talk Radio News Service

Lawmakers and members of the tech industry went head to head Thursday on the issue of whether the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) of 1998 should undergo an overhaul in response to technological advances made in the last decade.

Executives from Microsoft and Facebook appearing before a Senate panel praised COPPA, which requires websites to gain parents’ consent before collecting or using any personal information given by children, as an effective tool, but argued against expanding the legislation.

"COPPA has enabled parents to take a more active and informed role deciding how their children can take advantage of the internet's many benefits...therefore, we do not believe that a legislative amendment is necessary at this time,” Microsoft Associate General Counsel Michael Hintze said.

Sen. John Rockefeller (D-W.VA.), was displeased with the executives' positions and said that he believed the two companies were too confident that they could protect children without the government's involvement.

"You ... ended up with the idea 'we will do this by ourselves, we really don’t need the government to tell us what to do,'" Rockefeller said.

The West Virginia Democrat also took shots at Google and Apple, who both declined to appear before the committee.

“Could they not get the people here because they couldn’t afford the plane tickets?" the senator joked.