This article is one of a series written by Data Protection Education in collaboration with Litus Digital, a social media management company.  The articles came about from questions asked by Data Protection Education's customers, our own experience of working in education,  as school governors, parents and data protection professionals.  The articles raise questions about how social media can be used as safely as possible in a school environment,  security considerations, the law and protecting children.  It is not possible to cover every aspect of social media, but the articles aim to provide guidance, raise privacy questions and provide some support for safe posting.

The fifth article in this series is about the considerations around consent when you are posting about someone other than yourself, essentially sharing someone else's personal data.

Specific consent should be sought for each platform, and separate to the organisation’s photo/video policy.  Remember that if consent has been granted for use on the organisation's website, that does not automatically mean that consent is then given for any social media channels - the processing use is different.  In the case of seeking consent where the child is the data subject, then in most cases the consent of the parent is required.  However, for older children, consent may be sought from the child directly.  Where consent is sought, you should consider that consent may be withdrawn at any time (by the parent or the child), in which case, all posts relating to that data subject should be removed from all relevant platforms.  In cases where there are photos of a child on a school website where it has been included in a banner on the site, this can sometimes lead to extra costs, so should be taken into consideration when building/designing a new website.

Review: Model Photo and Video Consent Form.

Review: Photo and Video Guidelines

The age of consent in data protection law only applies to information society services, all other rights are not age specific.

It is also worth considering that as some children move into teenage years their perception of the world changes and they may wish to become more private, especially on social media channels.  Often teens and tweens have their privacy settings high, often so their parents can’t see what they are posting online.  However, what this does mean, is that a child in secondary school could potentially ask for posts to be removed about themselves.  Some posts/photos might now cause embarrassment, for example.  This might become even more pertinent when a child leaves school and starts work, they might wish for all social media posts to be removed – although according to retention procedures, it already should have been.

Review: Model Photo Consent Withdrawal Form.

Consider that when someone has left an organisation whether you still have a legal basis for sharing/displaying their information and that if consent was used the person may ask for it to be removed at any time.

Guardians of Privacy: Social Media Articles

Other Articles about Photos: