Managing social network accessibility based on age

摘要

When a user having an age less than a threshold age (a child user) attempts to access an online service or perform actions using the online service, the online service obtains parental authorization from an additional user having a parental relationship to the user. The child user may identify the user having the parental relationship and the online service verifies the validity of the identified user's account, the age of the identified user, and/or a connection between the identified user and the child user having a parental relationship type. The online service may make these verifications based in part social and transactional information associated with the identified user's account. Upon successful verification, the online service allows the identified user to authorize account creation for the child user, and/or manage the account and actions of the child user.

主权项

1. A computer-implemented method comprising:
receiving, from a purported parent user, a request to regulate actions of a child user in a social networking system, the child user having an age that is less than a threshold age; accessing information associated with an account in the social networking system of the purported parent user and accessing information associated with an account in the social networking system of the child user; determining whether a parent-child relationship exists between the purported parent user and the child user based on (1) the information associated with the account of the purported parent user and (2) the information associated with the account of the child user, wherein determining whether a parent-child relationship exists between the purported parent user and the child user comprises:
determining whether the account of the purported parent user is valid,determining whether the account of the purported parent user is associated with a purported parent user age that is equal to or exceeds an adult age threshold, anddetermining that the purported parent user has a parent-child relationship with the child user based on the determination that the account of the purported parent user is valid and on the determination that the account of the purported parent is associated with a purported parent user age that is equal to or exceeds the adult age threshold; responsive to determining an existence of a parent-child relationship between the purported parent user and the child user, determining whether the account of the purported parent user is connected to the account of the child user; responsive to determining that the account of the purported parent user is not connected to the account of the child user, automatically establishing, by a computer, a connection in the social networking system between the account of the child user and the account of the purported parent user, the established connection having a connection type indicating a parent-child relationship, wherein the child user is prevented from unilaterally terminating the established connection between the account of the child user and the account of the purported parent user; responsive to determining that the parent-child relationship exists between the purported parent user and the child user, prompting the purported parent user to provide administrative settings regulating actions of the child user in the social networking system; receiving, from the purported parent user, administrative settings regulating connection request actions of the child user in the social networking system; and managing actions by the child user in social networking system based on the administrative settings received from the purported parent user.