BY: SALSABIELA JAMAL

‘Sharenting’ is the simple exercise by which parents, guardians, or other elders share photos or videos of children on social media platforms which can bring harm by exposing them to online predators.

This has resulted with a senior partner in a legal firm calling for amendments to the Child Act 2001 to include provisions or extension to the online world by incorporating a section to provide a comprehensive legal framework.

The legal expert suggests that the key provisions should include defining sharenting, prohibiting the sharing of images of infants, requiring joint parental consent and ensuring child participation in decision making

Other suggestions that were expressed include limiting what content that can be shared, allowing the right to retract consent and request content removal as well as legal recourse and third-party intervention.

Legal sources state that sharenting needs to be clearly defined and there should be prohibition on the sharing of any images or personal information of children under the age of seven to recognise they are incapable of providing consent.

Also, there should be limitations on the type and volume of content shared online, as well as restrictions on sharing content that may be intimate, sensitive or potentially embarrassing to the child.

-THE MALAYSIA VOICE

** The views expressed on this opinion is of the writer and not the publisher