Obama Worries About Malia Using Facebook, Cites Privacy Concerns

The President of the United States and the First Lady both have their own Facebook and Twitter accounts – Foursquare, Pinterest, Google+, and Tumblr too. And though the accounts are (mostly) mai...
Obama Worries About Malia Using Facebook, Cites Privacy Concerns
Written by Josh Wolford

The President of the United States and the First Lady both have their own Facebook and Twitter accounts – Foursquare, Pinterest, Google+, and Tumblr too. And though the accounts are (mostly) maintained by campaign aides, you occasionally get a real post or tweet from the POTUS and the FLOTUS.

But for President Obama, the social media love stops with the parents. According to him, the other members of the first family are not quite ready to join the world of Facebook.

In a recent interview with MTV’s Sway Calloway, Obama said that his oldest daughter Malia does not have her own Facebook page. Why? He wants to protect her privacy.

Here’s what he had to say, courtesy Yahoo News:

“I’d worry about Facebook right now. I know the folks at Facebook obviously they’ve revolutionized, you know, the social networks. But Malia, because she’s well known, I’m very keen on her protecting her privacy…She can make her own decisions obviously later as she gets older, but right now, even just for security reasons, she doesn’t have a Facebook page. Dates, that’s fine, ’cause she’s got Secret Service protection.”

Malia is 14 years old. The youngest Obama child, Sasha, is 11. She technically wouldn’t be allowed to create a Facebook account until she turns 13 – although Facebook has struggled with enforcing that term or service since its inception.

Earlier this year, we reported that Facebook was considering letting in pre-teens, with some sort of strict parental controls of course.

It’s sometimes odd to think about the life of a first child. Of course, we all recognize that their daily routine – going to school, hanging out with friends, even taking a walk outside is going to be completely different than a regular person’s routine. It simply comes with the territory. But the fact that operating a Facebook account, something that 1 billion people do on a monthly basis, is simply out of the question, makes you think about what it means to be in the political spotlight.

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