...is a law passed in 1998 to protect children, mainly from online predators and exposure to pornographic material.

The main juxt of the act is to require that websites not be allowed to collect personal information from minors (in the case of COPPA: a minor is under the age of 13). This includes prohibiting the collection of information required for registration on a site, participating on web site forums or social networking sites.

Various levels of parental permissions are often required (some only requiring a box be checked stating the visitor is over 13). Some sites with kid-specific content, like Neopets.com, restrict kids under 13 from participating on the forums on their site.

As a rule we ALWAYS require a “statement of age” on all forums, chats and other web visitor particpation opportunities that we create for clients, regardless of the web content.

…for more info on what COPPA is and ways to comply:
http://www.coppa.org