Give Children More Control Of Data Privacy

The UK’s Children’s Commissioner is calling on the Government to set up a digital ombudsman to force social media companies bolster their privacy settings for youngsters, amid fears their personal information is being exploited by big brands.

The demand is one of a number of recommendations from a year-long study, Growing Up Digital by Children’s Commissioner for England Anne Longfield, which looked into how well, children are prepared to engage with the Internet.

According to the study, the time children spend online is continuing to increase:

• 3 to 4 year olds’ online use increased from 6 hours 48 minutes to 8 hours 18 minutes a week over the past year.
• While 12 to 15 year olds spend over 20 hours a week online.

Led by an expert advisory group, Growing Up Digital found that when children use social media they sign up to impenetrable terms and conditions that they could never be expected to understand. These harbor hidden clauses which waive their right to privacy and allow the content they post to be sold.

The terms and conditions of Instagram, for instance, which is used by 56% of 12-15 year olds and 43% of 8-11 year olds were tested with a group of teenagers.

Younger ones were unable to read more than half of the 17 pages of text, which run to 5,000 words, and none understood fully what the terms and conditions committed them to. An expert in privacy law on the Growing Up Digital panel simplified, demystified and condensed the terms and conditions so that they were comprehensible to teenagers, leaving many of them shocked by what they had unwittingly signed up to.

Growing Up Digital makes a number of recommendations, including:

• that every child in the country studies digital citizenship to build online resilience, learn about their rights and responsibilities online and prepare them for their digital lives.
• that social media companies rewrite their terms and conditions so that children understand and can make informed decisions about them.
• that the Government implements legislation similar to that being introduced by the EU to protect children’s privacy and data online.
• a recommendation that children should be give more power to tackle social media companies by appointing a digital ombudsman to mediate between them over the removal of content.

Longfield said: “Children spend half their leisure time online. The Internet is an incredible force for good but it is wholly irresponsible to let them roam in a world for which they are ill-prepared, which is subject to limited regulation and which is controlled by a small number of powerful organisations.

It is critical that children are educated better so that they can enjoy the opportunities provided by the Internet whilst minimising the well-known risks.

“It is also vital that children understand what they agree to when joining social media platforms, that their privacy is better protected, and they can have content posted about them removed quickly should they wish to.

“I urge the Government to extend the powers of the Children’s Commissioner so that there is independent oversight of the number and type of complaints that social media providers are receiving from young people and I can recommend further action where required.

“When it was created 25 years ago, the Internet was not designed with children in mind. No one could have predicted its phenomenal growth, nor that it would become ingrained in every aspect of everyday life. We need to rethink the way we prepare children for the digital world.”

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