Standing on the global AI platform in New Delhi, French President Emmanuel Macron and Prime Minister Narendra Modi both made fervent appeals for the internet and social media being made a safe place for children. Macron said France was working hard to ban social networks for children under 15, along with others in Europe like Spain and Greece; and he hoped India “would join the club.”
Mr Modi echoed Macron’s sentiments. “We must become more vigilant about children’s safety. Just as a school syllabus is curated, the AI space must be child-safe, and family guided,” the Indian Prime Minister said.
Thousands of miles away in the U.S. the spotlight is on mental health too of millions of kids suffering from internet addiction. A jury in Los Angeles is currently hearing arguments against Meta and its CEO, Mark Zuckerburg. The trial has highlighted cases such as Jordon DeMay, a 17-year teen who took his life in 2022 after being targeted in an online sextortion scam on Instagram. While Zuckerburg has apologized to parents, and promised tighter screening, a non-profit monitoring group, Fairplay, has found just about one of 5 screening tools on Instagram are working effectively.
Australian trigger
The dangers of uncontrolled access to the internet on young minds, the sexual exploitation and other online harassment they face, the problem of digital addiction etc have come to the fore again after Australia, faced with a national crisis of children’s mental health and safety of children, was the first to ban social media for children under 16.
Australia’s Online Safety Amendment (Social Media Minimum Age) Act 2024 went into effect on 10 December, last year, forcing major platforms to deactivate millions of underage accounts.
The legislation has a comprehensive regulatory framework managed by an eSafety Commissioner. He lays down safety rules for tech companies and holds rapid take-down powers when detecting harmful content or cyber bullying. Most significantly, the law shifts the burden of implementing the ban from the parents to the operating companies. It is platforms such as Meta, TikTok, Snapchat, Reddit and YouTube who have to put systems in place to block off minors. These companies also face huge deterrent fines up to $34 million in case of violations in implementing the ban.
Though there is still to be a global consensus on the issue, Australia’s law has acted as a catalyst. A clutch of countries are now moving fast to ensure safety controls. Denmark has passed legislation banning social media for under-16s, and is working to launch a age-verification app. France’s legislative assembly has passed a bill for an under-15 ban and the bill is now awaiting sanction by the Senate. Others at various drafting stages for an ‘Australian-style’ law include the United Kingdom, Spain and Malaysia.
In India, the government has just began formal consultations with social media companies regarding age-based restrictions. This was probably triggered by the pre-Budget Economic Survey penned by the Chief Economic Advisor to the the Union government, V. Anantha Nageswaran. He recommended the government consider age-based limits for social media use by children. Though not binding, it will likely impact the government’s social media policy.
There is noticeable rumbling in the more digitally educated states too. An assembly member from the Telugu Desam Party in Andhra Pradesh has moved a private member bill seeking to bar children under 16 from social media. Meanwhile the Andhra government has set up a group of ministers to study global regulatory frameworks and invited major platforms, including Meta, X, Google and ShareChat, for consultations. The companies haven't reacted yet.
Priyank Kharge, the IT minister of Karnataka, told the state assembly that the government was discussing a "digital detox" programme involving around 300,000 students and 100,000 teachers that the government launched in partnership with Meta.
Corporate greed
The BIg Tech firms, hit the hardest by the creeping controls on what was a laissez faire regime, have been campaigning that age bans are difficult to implement. Tech-savvy teens can easily bypass age restrictions using virtual private networks (VPNs) or by simply lying about their birth date, they say. Moreover, enforcing age verification requires collecting sensitive data, such as government-issued IDs, which poses a significant data breach.
Ban of content access, some of them argue, is a violation of the fundamental right to free speech, which in the long run undermines digital literacy. They also press the case that a ban tends to push teenagers toward less-regulated, more dangerous platforms rather than keeping them safer.
But these arguments must be taken with a pinch of salt. It is really the commercial value of Gen Z that Big Tech is loathe to forego. Those under 18, the world over, spend more time on the internet, and are more aggressive consumers of digital products. Social media platforms Facebook, Instagram, SnapChat, TikTok, X, and YouTube collectively derived $11 billion in advertising revenue from US-based users younger than 18 in 2022, according to a new study led by the Harvard T.H. Chan School for Public Health.
Though kids will always find ways to circumvent blocks and bans, it is not a good enough reason why restrictive usage of the internet for children should not be implemented. A combination of rigorous age verification by internet platforms, easy access to education content, and strong parental oversight can make the internet a safer place.
With the Australia and France legislation the genie is out of the bottle, and it will be difficult for Big Tech to put it back in.