President Obama Does Not Let His Daughters Use Facebook

So how is it like to be in the White House? There is no Facebook!

Well... at least for U.S. President Barack Obama's daughters - Sasha and Malia.

The President and the First Lady, Michelle Obama, do not, apparently, let their daughters be a part of the world's biggest social networking site - Facebook. The parents gave an interview to People magazine, for the year-end issue, explaining that their children were not allowed on Facebook because: why would we want to have a whole bunch of people who we don't know knowing our business? That doesn't make much sense.

There are over 800 million active users on the networking site, which also stipulates a minimum age limit of 13 (or even older in some jurisdictions) for anyone looking to sign up. According to the age limit, therefore, only Malia is allowed an account; Sasha has to wait 3 years. The girls' parents must feel, given how their children are, it makes sense to restrict their online activities.

We'll see how they feel in four years, said Obama.

Unfortunately, in spite of the age-limit, set by The Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), there are plenty of children on the site. While some do it with their parents' knowledge and permission, a lot of them register with false details regarding their age.

The Web site admits there is a problem with young children signing up with false identities and adds it is a difficult problem to deal with. In September, for example, a father wanted to sue the company after his 12-year-old daughter posted sexually explicit pictures of herself on the site, according to a report on zdnet.com. The father argued that Facebook did not properly enforce its own policy on age limits.

According to the report, Facebook uses back-end technology to try and prevent underage users from re-signing on the Web site, once their account is deleted. However, it is difficult, Facebook continued, to track every new user's age.

All said and done, at a time when there are increasing numbers of crimes against children and social networking sites are proving to be the favored hunting grounds of such criminals, it appears the President and the First Lady are good parents, despite their busy schedules.