UK social media restrictions for under-18s confirmed

The new restrictions are additional to child online safety measures the government outlined last month. Those measures include a ban on social media companies offering their services to children under the age of 16 in the UK, as well as blocks on livestreaming and stranger communication with under-16s and the imposition of minimum age requirements of 18 for AI chatbots that either operate as a “romantic companion” or have “similar intimate functionalities”.

The additional restrictions, announced on Wednesday, follow a government-commissioned study into the impact of social media restrictions on 13 to 17-year-olds and are designed to “ensure there is no cliff edge in protections as young people move into their later teenage years”, the government said.

The government said it intends to lay regulations before parliament, making provision for the restrictions, before the end of the year, with a view to them coming into force in spring 2027.

Gemma Erskine of Pinsent Masons, who specialises in online safety regulation at Pinsent Masons, said: “Unlike the ban for under-16s, these measures for 16- and 17-year-olds can be switched off by the users themselves. This creates an important question around the allocation of responsibility where platforms have complied with their obligations by applying the safeguards by default. Greater clarity will be needed on the extent to which platforms remain responsible once a young person has actively chosen to adjust those settings, and how regulators will assess compliance in those circumstances.”

“The announcement also highlights the growing reliance being placed on age assurance measures. To make this regime work, platforms must be able to accurately distinguish between users who are under 16, those who are 16 or 17, and adults. Yet the government has offered little clarity on how platforms are expected to achieve that in practice, or how they are to reconcile increasingly stringent age verification requirements with their data protection and privacy obligations. Age assurance is rapidly becoming the cornerstone of online safety regulation, but the legal and practical challenges of implementing it remain largely unresolved,” she said.

New research published by the government has highlighted that more than a quarter of children aged between 11 and 17 in the UK have used a virtual private network (VPN), including for the purpose of circumvention age-related restrictions on access to online content.

A further package of measures will follow on from the first raft of restrictions, the government said, to “help children use AI chatbots safely”.

Under those measures, providers will be required to ensure under-18s take regular breaks in using their AI chatbots, while a ban on “chatbots that pose a serious threat to children” is also under consideration. The government has also pledged to publish guidance for children, parents and guardians on how to use AI safely and confidently and to boost media literacy in schools – including through updates to the national curriculum in England to “teach children to navigate new types of technology including artificial intelligence and AI chatbots, identify mis- and disinformation as well as violent and misogynistic content”.

Erskine said: “The government should undertake further research into the impact of AI chatbots on children. Any future approach will need to strike a careful balance between addressing higher-risk chatbots, such as romantic chatbots, and preserving access to general-purpose AI tools, which offer significant educational benefits, notwithstanding the fact that they may in some circumstances generate content that is inappropriate for children.”