Parental consent records maintained with timestamp, method, parent identity

COPPA §312.6 grants parents the right to review the information collected from their child and to revoke consent at any time. Without a durable consent record, an operator cannot verify that consent was obtained, cannot respond to a parental review request with evidence, and cannot trace whether a specific child account was legitimately authorized. If the FTC investigates and the operator cannot produce records showing when consent was given, by whom, and via which method, the absence of records is treated as an absence of consent. The consent record is also the anchor for the parent's revocation rights — without it, revocation cannot be cleanly executed.

Create a dedicated parental_consents table that stores the child account link, parent identifier, consent method, and timestamp. Write the record before activating the child account.

-- Migration: create parental_consents table
CREATE TABLE parental_consents (
  id             UUID PRIMARY KEY DEFAULT gen_random_uuid(),
  child_user_id  UUID NOT NULL REFERENCES users(id) ON DELETE CASCADE,
  parent_email   TEXT NOT NULL,
  method         TEXT NOT NULL,  -- 'email_link', 'signed_form', etc.
  consented_at   TIMESTAMPTZ NOT NULL DEFAULT now(),
  revoked_at     TIMESTAMPTZ,
  metadata       JSONB DEFAULT '{}'
);

// Record consent before creating the child user record
await db.parentalConsent.create({
  data: {
    childUserId: child.id,
    parentEmail: pending.parentEmail,
    method: 'email_link',
    consentedAt: new Date(),
    metadata: { ip: req.headers.get('x-forwarded-for'), tokenUsed: params.token }
  }
})