Facebook booting underage users - a good move!

A few days ago, while Facebooking, I received a friend request from my 12 year old cousin. I was excited at the beginning since the last time I had seen her she was only 5 years old, but after seeing her pictures I could see she is certainly no longer 5, and she already knows how to "pose with an attitude" hence her profile picture. She also has more friends than I do, as well as more "tagged" pictures and "farmville" updates.

I figured this was uneventful, however I began to wonder the repercussions of  her being digitally "socially active" at such a tender age. I know new generations act way older than their actual age,  however they are still quite vulnerable and I began to search what were social media outlets doing to protect or prevent young kids from starting so early, specifically Facebook.

According to a study by the Pew Internet American Life Project, nearly half of all 12-year-olds in the U.S. are using social network sites, despite not meeting the minimum age requirements for sites like Facebook. And such popularity only balloons once the teens grow older: roughly 64% of 13-year-olds are social networking; between the ages of 14 to 17, that figure jumps to 82%, says Pew.

Facebook's chief privacy adviser Mozelle Thompson agreed that underage users were taking advantage of the site. When you sign up you can basically decide how old you want to be, and Facebook has no mechanisms to detect whether a teen is telling the truth or not. "It's not perfect," said Thompson, however, Facebook is trying to stop these youngsters from continuing to use the site. Thompson said "Facebook removes 20,000 people a day, people who are underage." Of course, that's a fraction of the nearly 600 million users on Facebook, but underage users have become a growing concern for the network, especially as it faces increased pressure from regulators.

Although regulators pressure here and there, the fundamental concern should come from the parents and family around these kids. One cannot escape the fact that kids will find a way to be online and be "socially active" as soon as they can, so in their best interest, the one thing that can be done is to explain about privacy, navigate WITH THEM through Facebook and "HIDE" things from strangers while explaining the implications of sharing photos and posts. I mean, I am 30 years old and my Facebook page is as exclusive as a NYC club -  the only people allowed in, are people I know in person, have met more than once in my life, and are actually people I like.