Child Influencers and Judicial Authorization: The New Governance Duty for Brands, Agencies, and Platforms

The professionalization of children's and teenagers' presence on social media is no longer a matter restricted to families — it has become part of corporate governance agendas. Brands, agencies, production companies, digital platforms, and marketing managers increasingly use content featuring child influencers to connect products with specific audiences. However, the commercial visibility of a child cannot be treated as a simple communication strategy. In Brazil, it involves fundamental rights, personal data protection, advertising aimed at children, artistic work, and corporate responsibility.

The enactment of the Digital Statute of the Child and Adolescent (Estatuto Digital da Criança e do Adolescente), Law No. 15,211/2025, regulated by Decree No. 12,880/2026, and National Council of Justice (CNJ) Resolution No. 687/2026, published in the CNJ's Official Gazette on July 1, 2026, consolidate a significant change. Monetized or boosted content that habitually explores the image or routine of children and adolescents now requires judicial authorization ("alvará judicial"). For the business environment, the issue is not limited to whether a family-run profile is in good standing. It represents a new layer of legal compliance in digital campaigns, advertising contracts, and relationships with creators.

The New Regulatory Framework for Digital Childhood

The Federal Constitution grants absolute priority to children and adolescents under Article 227, while the Child and Adolescent Statute (Estatuto da Criança e do Adolescente – ECA) protects their dignity, image, identity, privacy, and development. The Consolidation of Labor Laws (CLT), in Articles 403 and 404, reinforces the prohibition of work before the minimum age, allowing exceptions only in legally controlled circumstances. ILO Convention No. 138, incorporated into Brazilian law, also permits children's artistic participation only exceptionally and subject to appropriate safeguards.

The novelty introduced by the Digital ECA and the CNJ regulation lies in recognizing that artistic and advertising activity in the digital environment has its own particular features. A homemade recording can circulate indefinitely, be clipped by third parties, generate revenue through views, feed algorithms, build consumption profiles, and expose the child to comments, harassment, or premature adultification. That is why the concept of "exposure load," set out in CNJ Resolution No. 687/2026, gains strategic importance. The judge must assess the frequency of posts, appearances, and activities — including on accounts held by guardians or third parties — to gauge the real impact on the child or adolescent.

Not every appearance of a child on social media requires judicial authorization. The requirement focuses on monetized or boosted content that habitually explores the minor's image or routine. Even so, this delimitation should not lead companies toward a minimalist reading. When there is an advertising campaign, a commercial partnership, a barter arrangement, a script, performance expectations, direct or indirect compensation, agency involvement, or recurring use of a child's image to promote a brand, legal risk intensifies. The central question is no longer simply whether the content generates engagement, but whether the participation serves the child's best interests.

Judicial Authorization Is Not a Formality — It Is a Risk-Control Instrument

CNJ Resolution No. 687/2026 defines the judicial authorization ("alvará") as court approval for a child's or adolescent's participation in artistic activity conveyed through monetized or boosted content in the digital environment, whenever there is habitual exploitation of their image or routine. The request must include information about legal guardians, the accounts and channels involved, scripts, contracts, monetization details, advertising, barter arrangements, exposure history, estimated frequency, educational status, health conditions, and the minor's daily routine.

The judicial decision must be individualized. The judge assesses the compatibility of the activity with the child's age and physical, psychological, moral, social, and educational development, the child's or adolescent's own expressed wishes, any signs of coercion, family pressure, undue economic exploitation, and risks of characterizing the activity as child labor. The authorization must specify the duration, the channels covered, the maximum weekly workload, and applicable conditions and safeguards. The maximum term is 12 months for children and 18 months for adolescents, with renewal subject to a new review.

For companies, this logic shifts the focus from improvisation to documentation. Campaigns involving child influencers must be preceded by due diligence, content review, verification of the applicable judicial authorization, age assessment, review of compensation clauses, and a clear allocation of responsibilities among the brand, agency, production company, legal guardian, and platform. A parent's signature alone does not replace judicial authorization when the situation falls under the rule. Nor is it prudent to shift all contractual risk onto the family, since a company that economically benefits from the exposure may be included in the chain of liability.

Advertising, Personal Data, and Platform Responsibility

The topic also intersects with the Brazilian General Data Protection Law (LGPD), the Brazilian Civil Rights Framework for the Internet (Marco Civil da Internet), the Consumer Defense Code, and rules on advertising directed at children. Law No. 15,211/2025 restricts profiling practices and targeted advertising aimed at children and adolescents, reinforces privacy by default, requires parental supervision mechanisms, and imposes risk-prevention and mitigation duties on providers of digital products and services. In influencer marketing campaigns, this means that the processing of minors' data, audience segmentation, content boosting, metric collection, and content reuse must be evaluated through the lens of comprehensive child protection.

The CNJ resolution also establishes the National Database of Judicial Authorizations for Children's and Adolescents' Artistic Activity (Banco Nacional de Alvarás para Atividade Artística de Crianças e Adolescentes), designed to enable traceability, oversight, and consultation of authorizations. Until it is fully operational, the authorization certificate may serve to prove validity, conditions, channels, content types, and authorized limits. In practice, platforms and companies will need to move from a reactive stance to mechanisms of prior verification, document retention, internal controls, and workflows for removing or suspending irregular content.

Case law reinforces this protective interpretation. In Special Appeal (REsp) 1,628,700, the Superior Court of Justice (STJ) recognized liability for publishing images of children without guardians' authorization, emphasizing comprehensive protection and the child's best interests. In REsp 1,783,269, the Court held that an application provider must remove content offensive to a minor once notified of the violation, even without a court order, given the precedence of the ECA as a special protective framework. At the Federal Supreme Court (STF), Declaratory Action of Constitutionality (ADC) 51 confirmed the application of Brazilian jurisdiction to data-related matters involving providers operating in the country, while Direct Action of Unconstitutionality (ADI) 5,326 is relevant in delimiting judicial competence over authorizations related to children's artistic work, without excluding the complementary role of labor authorities when there are signs of irregularity.

Practical Impacts for Companies

The most immediate impact is on contracts. Agreements involving child influencers must include the obligation to present the judicial authorization when applicable, an exact description of the authorized activity, the publication channels, frequency limits, compensation policy, asset-protection measures, rules on editing and republication, grounds for campaign suspension, and liability for noncompliance. It is also advisable that scripts, briefs, and internal approvals be compatible with the participant's age and preserve their image, privacy, schooling, health, and leisure time.

The second impact concerns marketing governance. Brands that hire creators must incorporate child and adolescent protection criteria into their campaign approval process. This includes avoiding sexualized, humiliating, degrading, or discriminatory content, as well as content associated with betting, gambling, products prohibited for minors, or practices that encourage dangerous behavior. The analysis should not be limited to the formal legality of the advertisement. Corporate reputation may be affected by perceptions of premature adultification, economic exploitation of childhood, or the inappropriate use of family intimacy as a commercial asset.

The third impact concerns data and evidence management. Companies must record the legal basis for processing minors' data, restrict internal access to information about minors, limit the retention of materials, review content-boosting permissions, keep proof of judicial authorizations, and document decisions to remove content. In a scenario of oversight by the Judiciary, the Public Prosecutor's Office, labor authorities, data protection agencies, and consumer defense entities, the ability to demonstrate due diligence will be just as important as the original intent behind the campaign.

The regulation of child influencers does not represent a ban on children's and adolescents' participation in digital artistic activities. It establishes that the habitual economic exploitation of their image requires judicial oversight, concrete safeguards, and shared responsibility. For business owners and managers, the essential point is to understand that digital childhood has become a matter of compliance, governance, data protection, civil liability, consumer law, and labor law.

Companies that act preventively tend to reduce legal, reputational, and operational risks. The review of contracts, approval workflows, marketing policies, data-processing practices, and relationships with platforms should take place before a campaign goes live — not only after a crisis. In this context, specialized legal counsel plays an important role in translating complex rules into sound business decisions, preserving commercial strategy without departing from the core value that guides the entire Brazilian legal system: the comprehensive protection of children and adolescents.