People of all ages use Facebook, whether it’s to catch up with old friends from school, make plans for the weekend, or play Candy Crush, it has something for every age group. Until now, the minimum age for Facebook has been 13.
One of the largest issue’s Facebook has is enforcing those age-restrictions. Consumer reports last year said 7.5 million children under the age of 13 were using the site, including more than five million under the age of 10.
At a young age, this generation of Facebook users found it easy to get around these restrictions. These techniques, learned through the use of Myspace, made people realize that as long as you changed the year, you could pass as any age you wanted to.
Now, according to the Wall Street Journal, Facebook is reconsidering adding parental controls to its website, to allow for people under the age of 13 to join the social media site without having to lie about their age.
However, even these restrictions would be hard to enforce, as not all parents are aware of their children’s internet activity. This issue has led to a new discussion about raising the age level, instead of lowering it.
CNN recently suggested that they feel the age should be raised to 21, as this is the drinking age as well. However, the most talked about age requirement has become 18, the age a person is considered an adult. CNN posted a question asking, “Should 11-year-olds join Facebook?” sparking a lot of differing responses.
Right now everything is just opinion, and Facebook is only considering implementing restrictions, so those under the age of 13 shouldn’t fret.
