Last week, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) determined that companies covered by the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) can use facial recognition technologies to match a parent’s photo on a government-issued identification to “selfies” that the parent submits via mobile phone or webcam as a method of verifiable parental consent, as required by COPPA. The FTC said, “Evidence demonstrates that a method that involves verifying a government-issued identification and then matching the image on that identification with the captured face of a  live person can be ‘reasonably calculated, in light of available technology, to ensure that the person providing consent is the child’s parent’ as required by [COPPA].” Under this new form of verifiable parental consent, the parent would first provide a valid image of their government-issued identification, for example a passport or a driver’s license, the authenticity or legitimacy is verified using computer vision technology, algorithms, and image forensics, the parent then is prompted to submit a “selfie” to confirm the photo is of a live person, and finally, the live image is compared to the identification image. This is only the second time the FTC has approved a new verifiable parental consent method since COPPA regulations were revised over two years ago.

[View source.]