A fierce debate was sparked after some reports suggested that Facebook is considering allowing users who are younger than 13 years of age, to join the world’s largest social networking site.

Under the current rules, the company bars anyone below the age of 13 to join the service but it is believed that as many as 7.5 million users on the site are below that age mark. The company is believed to looking at a system in which children’s account will be linked to their parents, who will be able to device what the children can or cannot access of the site.

Parents will have control who their children are adding as friends and what apps can they access on the network. Some say that Facebook is not able to detect children lying about their age and accessing the site. According to a leaked indication, the company believes that it has to do something about the situation and it considering ways to allow children to join.

Allowing younger users will open up a new revenue stream for the company through advertisers, who eagerly want to target young users. On the other hand, some express concerns that children are not prepared to enter the social networking world where they might face predators or bullies or might be exposed to inappropriate content.