In today’s digital world, children interact with technology more than ever before. From online classrooms and learning apps to interactive gaming and social content, young users generate a significant amount of personal information. Yet, this very engagement with digital services makes them especially vulnerable to privacy risks from inadvertent tracking to profiling and commercial exploitation. Against this backdrop, protecting minors’ data isn’t just a legal requirement; it’s a fundamental responsibility for every digital platform operator.
India’s legislative response, anchored in the Digital Personal Data Protection Act (DPDPA) and its accompanying rules, reflects that imperative. These frameworks introduce specific child data processing rules and concepts, such as parental consent DPDP mechanisms that platforms must observe rigorously. For educational technology providers, navigating these expectations while maintaining innovation and user experience poses a unique challenge, one that demands both legal insight and strong privacy design.
Understanding Children’s Data and Its Risks
Children’s data, in its broadest sense, includes any piece of information that identifies or relates to a person below the age of 18, from names and school details to behavioural patterns, device identifiers, and digital footprints. The challenge with such data is that children often lack the cognitive ability to understand terms of service, privacy statements, or the implications of sharing information online.
This gap in comprehension exposes them to risks such as identity theft, behavioral profiling, predatory marketing, and long-term tracking across platforms. Thus, meaningful protective measures that go beyond generic privacy notices are essential to uphold children’s dignity and autonomy in the digital sphere.
Also Read : Personalisation vs Privacy in 2025: Navigating DPDP
EdTech Platforms and Children’s Data
The rise of educational technology has transformed access to learning across India. EdTech platforms from personalised tutoring apps to adaptive learning ecosystems, harvest data to tailor educational experiences. While this data can enhance pedagogy, it also raises complex privacy questions, especially where platforms collect detailed information about children’s performance, routines, and engagement behaviour.
Without clear internal policies or sector-specific regulations, many EdTech companies risk non-compliance with fundamental EdTech privacy compliance expectations. Opaque data flows, lack of clear consent mechanisms, and use of third-party analytics tools without explicit parental authorisation can all undermine trust and expose children to unnecessary data usage.
Compounding this is the digital divide, where guardians in under-resourced communities may lack the familiarity to assess or question how these platforms use their children’s data. This highlights the urgency for transparent practices, robust parental controls, and interfaces designed with privacy in mind.
Also Read : Protecting Children’s Data Under the DPDP Rules
India’s Legal Framework on Child Data Protection
India’s regulatory landscape for children’s data has matured significantly with the DPDP Act and its operational rules, which lay down key child data processing rules to protect minors online. While the Act establishes the general regime, the rules provide actionable requirements for entities collecting or processing data of users under 18.
At the core of these rules is the mandate that data fiduciaries must obtain verifiable parental consent before processing any personal data of a child. This obligation ensures that a legitimate adult, typically a parent or legal guardian, explicitly agrees to the processing, reducing the risk of uninformed or inappropriate data usage by platforms.
Verifiable parental consent under DPDP involves reasonable measures to confirm that the consenting adult is truly the guardian and is identifiable, potentially through identity documents, identity tokens, or government-verified digital credentials. Additionally, the rules prohibit targeted advertising and behaviour-based tracking directed at children, while emphasising principles such as data minimisation and purpose limitation.
However, despite these important provisions, challenges persist, such as the broad age threshold of under 18 for all consent requirements, lack of child-centric design obligations, and practical difficulties in implementing robust age verification processes.
Practical EdTech Privacy Compliance Checklist
To ensure comprehensive protection of minors’ data and adhere to emerging norms, EdTech companies should consider the following:
- Implement Strong Consent Flows :
Build consent mechanisms that capture verifiable parental consent DPDP as a standard part of onboarding. These should be clear, easy to navigate, and compliant with verifiability standards.
- Data Minimisation :
Collect only data directly relevant to learning outcomes. Avoid capturing or storing behavioural metadata or tracking data unless it serves clear educational purposes.
- Transparent Notices :
Design privacy notices that use simple language and provide explicit information about what data is collected, how it is used, and what rights guardians and learners have.
- Age Verification :
Incorporate reliable age-screening mechanisms to ensure that consent requirements are appropriately applied for all users claimed to be minors.
- Secure Data Storage :
Apply strong encryption and access controls to protect stored data and regularly audit data access logs to detect anomalies.
Such a checklist not only supports legal compliance but also reinforces trust and safety as fundamental pillars of any learning platform’s user experience.
Also Read : Incident Management Under DPDP: A Complete Guide for 2025
How Privy by IDfy Helps EdTech Companies with Data Privacy
Navigating the complexities of DPDP compliance and child data protection is challenging, especially in the dynamic EdTech space. This is where Privy by IDfy steps in as a robust privacy management solution tailored for digital platforms.
Privy’s consent orchestration tools help EdTech companies automate the implementation of EdTech privacy compliance, especially around parental consent DPDP requirements. With Privy, platforms can:
- Capture and verify parental consent seamlessly during signup using secure, auditable workflows.
- Enforce age-based consent logic, ensuring that children’s data is only processed after legitimate guardian authorisation.
- Automate compliance reporting, making it easier to demonstrate adherence to child data processing rules during audits or inspections.
- Customise privacy notices and consent prompts,empowering organisations to maintain transparency and clarity with users and guardians.
By centralising consent governance, Privy reduces operational burden and helps EdTech firms build privacy by design into their products, fostering trust among users and aligning with regulatory expectations.
Also Read : Importance of Parental Consent Under DPDP Rules
Conclusion
The digital age presents unparalleled opportunities for children to learn, connect, and explore. Yet, without adequate safeguards, the same technologies can expose them to privacy harms that can have long-lasting impacts. India’s DPDP framework, particularly the rules around parental consent, age verification, and child data processing, represents a significant stride toward protecting minors’ data in the digital ecosystem.
For EdTech companies, embracing these standards is not just a matter of compliance but a cornerstone of ethical product design and user trust. By integrating strong privacy practices and leveraging solutions like Privy by IDfy, organisations can ensure that innovation and protection go hand in hand, empowering young learners while honouring their rights and dignity in cyberspace.
Get in touch with us at shivani@idfy.com to take control over your data with India’s most trusted DPDP compliance platform. We will keep you updated on the latest developments regarding the DPDP rules and how they will impact your business. Stay glued to this space for more information on data, privacy, compliance, and all things DPDP.