SUING parents for publishing pictures of their children on the Internet and social media is one of the issues that has brought about a great deal of attention in Western countries with the focus on protecting the privacy and safety of children.
In France, parents have been warned of publishing photographs of their children on the Internet in order to avoid fines and imprisonment in case of conviction after a complaint by one of the sons that his privacy was violated on the Internet.
In Austria, parents are facing a lawsuit from their teenage child after they published more than 500 photos on Facebook, which she said made her feel embarrassed after her parents refused to delete the images.
According to a study from the University of Michigan on teenage children whose photos were published online, the majority expressed concerns about the way their parents published details of their lives and shared their journals with strangers.
In 2015, some parents were involved in publishing nearly 1,000 images of their child on the Internet before reaching the age of five. More than half of the pictures have been published on Facebook and the rest are on Twitter and Instagram, according to a British study, which also revealed that a quarter of respondents did not ask permission of their children before publishing the images.
In Saudi Arabia, it is very common to publish images of children without regard to violating a child’s privacy and security. Some mothers compete in publishing diaries of their child, often in violation of children’s rights and privacy.
In fact, some parents deliberately post photos and videos to embarrass their children, ridiculing them or even laughing at their actions without thinking of the future consequences for the child.
Other types of violations on social media include parents using children’s images as an identifier for their accounts on social networks. They express views and engage in controversial issues and conflicts while their profiles carry the image of a child. In addition, certain accounts use photos of children to market and display goods and products.
Many parents believe that they own their children and are entitled to do and act as they please, forgetting their responsibility to protect the child from harm. These photographs become a damaging factor for children when parents use their achievements to show off and appear as ideal. They also pose a threat to the safety and security of the child.
Irresponsible publishing contributes to the suffering and misery of the child after publishing embarrassing or inappropriate pictures that may cause the child suffering and misery, and may affect his or her future when searching for a job.
Finally: the use of common statements to confirm intellectual property rights such as “I don’t allow for this picture to be republished” commonly used online won’t exempt you from the responsibility to protect the child from the prying of strangers, and will not exempt you from the responsibility for the state of misery the child may experience in the future.
So before you share photos of your children with strangers think a thousand times of the potential issues and consequences that would be on the child after publication.
