THE campaign to ban social media for people under the age of 16 is gathering pace.
But implementing the policy could lead to people surrendering even more of their personal data to big tech companies, an expert has warned.
Heather Burns, a tech policy specialist and the author of Understanding Privacy, told The National that plans to prevent children from using social media would pose problems for adults while failing to address the big issues posed by platforms such as Facebook, Twitter/X and TikTok.
She said there were three main effects people could expect to see from a ban on young children using social media.
First would be the imposition of new barriers to adults looking to use social media, which Burns said would result in them having to further erode their privacy rights to access the technology.
She said: “All of us will have to verify our ages with many of the services we use every day, which may perversely mean handing over even more private data – such as passports – to tech giants who are already responsible for abusing our privacy every day.”
The tech expert, who advocates for a "open, globally connected, secure, and trustworthy" internet, said that those who do not give up more of their personal data to social media companies will be forced to use an "infantilised internet".
Burns added: “Two is that those of us who refuse to comply will find ourselves using an infantilised internet by design, where even legal and harmless content is censored as being potentially sensitive.
“This is already in practice on sites like BlueSky, which has removed the functionality for UK users to send direct messages to each other if they have not verified their age, based on the Online Safety Act labelling direct messaging as a vector for child abuse.
“In reality, all it does is make it difficult for middle-aged policy experts to have conversations with journalists.”
The third effect would be failing to address the problems posed by social media in the first place, Burns added.
She said: “Three is that none of the problems with social media will actually change, and young people will be thrown into that world on their 18th birthdays without the resilience to manage it. But again, it's not about their best interests, is it? It's about selling compliance software.”
Compliance software relates to the technology websites use to verify users’ ages. She said this had been a focus of lobbyists who helped to shape the UK Government’s Online Safety Act, which was brought in by the Tories and continued under Labour.
Burns added: “There is a raft of academic evidence showing that existing social media bans simply do not work, and do not solve any problems.
“But these bans do accomplish the true goal of these policy proposals, which is to force a captive market for the age verification software industry, whose rapacious corporate lobbying essentially shaped the Online Safety Act around its for-profit aspirations.
“As much as those greedy lobbyists hate to admit it, young people do have the rights to freedom of thought and freedom of expression. The real world which they discover via social media is part of that.
“Banning social media use based on age alone violates those rights, while doing nothing to fix the actual problems with social media which, as they are rather arrogantly told by adults who claim they know best, they are being protected from.”
While the UK Government is yet to commit to an outright ban, there is growing pressure on Keir Starmer to implement one, led by Labour big beasts like Wes Streeting and Angela Rayner.
Westminster’s Education Committee has also called for a ban and the House of Lords has voted for one multiple times.
Outside of Parliament, prominent campaigners such as the Molly Rose Foundation, founded in memory of the 14-year-old girl who took her own life after viewing harmful content online have said that a ban offer only “the perception of security”.
The Children’s Coalition for Online Safety, led by 5Rights Foundation and including groups such as the NSPCC and Girlguiding, has also demanded a broader overhaul of technology companies’ business models and product design choices that risk keeping young users hooked.
In a joint statement, 25 organisations called for a ban on targeted advertising and manipulative design features, a ban on personalised services for under-13s and default safety protections for under-16s with penalties for firms that fall short, stronger regulation of AI systems including child-focused risk assessments and the creation of an independent online safety commissioner.
The NSPCC has said tech companies must be forced to keep under-13s off social media, which the charity said would “immediately protect 2.5 million children, stopping platforms using design tricks which keep young people addicted, and blocking harmful content at the source”.
Families who have lost children to suicide visited the Prime Minister in Downing Street on Tuesday as he hinted the Government was set to take radical action.
He said he has ordered a “a game-changer” policy to tackle social media harms affecting children to be drawn up and pledged a crackdown “very quickly” just hours before a consultation to help the Government decide what action it should take, titled Growing Up In The Online World, closed.
