Well I made my forum the military one 18+ and I will ban any kids, when I find them.

You can never be 100% sure, but I see no difference in banning a kid than an adult.

They can be tricky and sound like adults but the soon show thier age.

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Tinkerbells Oasis

I wouldnt really care if they were 12 years old. As long as they arent doing anything wrong or anything.

Whats exactly wrong with a 12year old member? As long as they arent disruptive.

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Immortality will come to such as are fit for it

It's not that they're just not welcome (although in some forums they may not be), but there's a law called COPPA (mentioned many times in this thread) that prohibits any website in the US from gathering personal information from anybody under the age of 13 without parental consent...So, if you are in the US and let somebody under the age of 13 register in your forums without parental consent, you're breaking the law...You're not likely to get in touble unless your forums are huge, but it is breaking the law.

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Laws are meant to be broken are they not?

How can you enforce this coppa though? And how would you know if they have parental consent as its not hard to impersonate online.

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Immortality will come to such as are fit for it

If law enforcement thinks you may be violating COPPA, they'll test it out themselves...If they try to register in your forums and are never asked their age - you are in violation of COPPA laws. If they register, enter their age as less than 13 and are accepted - you are in violation of COPPA...and that's all they need to know.

If they get a hold of an angry parent who found at that their child registered on your website without parental consent and you can't prove otherwise, then you're in violation of COPPA.

Your job is simply to ask all new members if they are 13 or older - If they're 12, but lie and say that they are 13, then there's nothing you can do about that...You did your job by asking. If they create fake parental consent, again, there's nothing you can do about that other than use your best judgment (the same judgment that a *reasonable* person would make in the same situation).

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well i think its not such a big deal
if the forum is a good clean forum thens i think its just fine

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