Social media giants told to protect children from 'disturbing content'

The Children's Commissioner for England has called on YouTube, Snapchat, Pinterest and Facebook - the owners of Instagram - to back a statutory duty of care and a digital ombudsman to act as an independent arbiter between the platforms and their users.

In an open letter, Anne Longfield said the death of 14-year-old Molly Russellhighlighted the amount of harmful material children are able to access online.

The teenager's family later found she had viewed content on social media linked to anxiety, self-harm, depression and suicide before taking her own life in November 2017.

Ms Longfield questioned whether the tech firms still had control over the content appearing online, considering the rate at which the platforms had grown. She also demanded that social media giants provide information on the amount of self-harm related material available on their platforms as well as data on the amount of under-18s and under-13s using their platforms.

The Children's Commissioner also asked for details on what support was offered to those who searched for images of self-harm and what criteria was used to decide on whether posts or accounts were removed.

A spokesman for Instagram and Facebook said: "We have a huge responsibility to make sure young people are safe on our platforms and working together with the government, the Children's Commissioner and other companies is the only way to make sure we get this right."

He said the platforms were "taking measures aimed at preventing people from finding self-harm related content through search and hashtags".

If you feel emotionally distressed or suicidal please call Samaritans for help on 116 123 or email jo@samaritans.org.

https://news.sky.com/story/social-media-giants-told-to-protect-children-from-disturbing-content-11621968