In order to protect children online, laws, regulations and policies must define the age of a child. Age of a child is defined differently in different laws. In some countries and regions, the age of a child is anyone below the age of 18. In others, such as in Europe, under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) a child is anyone below the age of 16. In the U.S.A, a child is a person under the age of 13. These disparities may have a huge impact in the protection of children online, especially considering the internet has no boundaries and data ‘travels’ freely from one country to the other and between regions.

What happens to a person from a country where a child is a person of below 18 years whose person data is processed in a country where a child is a person of under 13 years? Can this person have rights and protection offered to a child (since he is a child in his/her country) or the rights and protection ceases?

In addition, there are laws that differentiate between a child (anyone below the age of 18) and adolescent (anyone above the age of 16 but below the age of 18).