This Wall Street Journal article explains how popular children’s websites are tracking children more invasively and aggressively than top sites targeting adults.

The Journal examined 50 sites popular with U.S. teens and children to see what tracking tools they installed on a test computer. As a group, the sites placed 4,123 “cookies,” “beacons” and other pieces of tracking technology. That is 30% more than were found in an analysis of the 50 most popular U.S. sites overall, which are generally aimed at adults.

The most prolific site: Snazzyspace.com, which helps teens customize their social-networking pages, installed 248 tracking tools. Its operator described the site as a “hobby” and said the tracking tools come from advertisers.

NOTE: Snazzyspace is not included in KangaPlace.

Starfall.com, an education site for young children, installed the fewest, five.

NOTE: Starfall is a favorite at KangaPlace. :)

Many kids’ sites are heavily dependent on advertising, which likely explains the presence of so many tracking tools. Research has shown children influence hundreds of billions of dollars in annual family purchases.

The WSJ article helps bring this problem to the attention of parents and educators.

Where does KangaPlace stand in all this?

I want to be clear on this. KangaPlace does not collect any information from children. I don’t install trackers and I don’t display or host ADs. As a parent myself, I greatly value my privacy and that of my children. KangaPlace fully respects your child’s privacy as well.

What can I do about it?

A WSJ Blog Article talks about what parents can do about protecting their child’s privacy.

Since most of the trackers are placed by ADs, the easiest approach is to block ADs. An excellent tool I personally use and recommend is a Firefox plugin called Adblock Plus.

• Firefox is a free, OpenSource browser that I recommend over Internet Explorer. It is 100% free, and safer than Internet Explorer.

• AdblockPlus is a free Firefox plugin that blocks ADs and their tracking cookies. Check out their site for a video demonstration of how it works. I love it and use it on all of my computers (especially the one for the kids).