Jeremy Hunt, Britain's health minister, has taken to social media to accuse Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg of reneging on a promise to prevent underage use on his site.
Not sure this is the right direction at all. Facebook told me they would come back with ideas to PREVENT underage use of their product, but instead they are actively targeting younger children. Stay away from my kids please Facebook and act responsibly! https://t.co/XrwfSHsUMj
— Jeremy Hunt (@Jeremy_Hunt) December 5, 2017
The father-of-three is angry the tech giant has developed an app targeting pre-teens despite the fact Facebook is supposed to have an age restriction of 13. Some younger children have, however, already managed to get around this by giving false dates of birth to open accounts.
The new Messenger Kids app has already been introduced in the US and is designed to give children aged between six and 12 a safe way to use social media. Parents can download the app, create a profile and then choose with friends and relatives they want to communicate with.
There will also be no display adverts or data collected on users to target them in advertising campaigns unlike the present Facebook set up.
The decision to introduce the app comes after calls for children and young people to be educated in using smartphones to stop them being exploited by the rising tide of sex offenders attempting to groom and sexually abuse them via digital technology.
A report The Digital Childhood had been commissioned by 5Rights, an initiative for youth digital rights launched two years ago by Baroness Beeban Kidron. It maintains children and young people should be at the center of the digital environment and not left behind or overlooked despite extreme risks, such as grooming and child sexual abuse.
Anxiety
In an interview, Dr. Elaine Kasket, a visiting principle lecturer at Regent's University London, said there is a lot of anxiety surrounding the impact of online activity and digital technologies on children.
"The risks of living with modern technologies are real, and there's no question the digital environment poses challenges for both adults and kids. All of us are vulnerable to being less active, to experiencing insomnia and altered sleep patterns, to constantly comparing ourselves to others on social media," she told Sputnik.
"Adam Alter writes about this in Irresistible, and one of the first points he makes is many of the Silicon Valley giants — like Steve Jobs — allegedly didn't let their kids use the technologies they were inventing."
Dr. Kasket says the more we can prepare kids to understand themselves and others in online environments and with respect to technologies, the better.
"Isolating them from tech doesn't help prepare them for life in the world but we need to help them be aware, reflective and flexible within and between digital and analog environments," she added.
Sean Parker, one of the Facebook founders, recently questioned the impact of social media on children.
"It probably interferes with productivity in weird ways. God only knows what it's doing to our children's brains."
