00:00The politics of the social media ban has already been set out.
00:06The harder question now is how it would work in everyday life.
00:10From spring 2027, children under 16 are expected to be blocked from major platforms.
00:18But any system will have to deal with age checks, shared devices, false details, workarounds, exemptions
00:24and the risk that some children simply move to other parts of the internet.
00:30A social media ban for young people, we're talking under 16s, many believe this is long overdue.
00:36Why is that?
00:37Well of course we've had mobile phones for what 15, 20 years, well I've had them for longer
00:42but I'm talking about phones that had the ability to access the internet and that's the real
00:46problem in terms of the social media sites and chat rooms and whatever else.
00:52These are highly addictive, they are constructed in such a way to be highly addictive so of
00:58course what that does, it sort of sucks out all the sort of the working hours or sort
01:02of kids are on these things outside of school and other activities that they might be involved
01:07in.
01:07So it's socially not good but more particularly what we've had are a number of sort of suicides
01:13and sort of stunts if I might call them whereby these things are sort of, you know, they're
01:18engendered online.
01:19People do things which of course lead to loss of life for young kids.
01:22The social media ban is expected to cover major platforms built around sharing, feeds,
01:29algorithms and interaction.
01:32That includes TikTok, Snapchat, Instagram, YouTube, Facebook and X.
01:37Messaging services such as WhatsApp and Signal are not expected to be included.
01:43Ofcom is expected to set out more detail on age assurance in the future.
01:49Then it's not good to be sort of spending quite so much of your sort of waking hours on these
01:53things.
01:53So it's regarded as something which should be good, it should be regulated.
01:58Now of course what does that mean?
01:59Well of course if children have parents you'd hope that they are regulating them but of course
02:04it's very difficult to sort of be on your child's case all of the time.
02:07So the government have felt moved to sort of to do something pretty radical.
02:12The real difficulty is, and of course this is the sort of the crunch, will it work?
02:16Because of course can you stop an under 16 year old, how do you sort of do that?
02:21Now of course it may be out of facial recognition, can you sort of do it through sort of password
02:26protection?
02:27I don't know, there's a whole set of sort of technical issues.
02:31Now of course the government can't do right for wrong.
02:33They've been regarded as being sort of too sort of lead and footed on this one and not
02:36moving fast enough.
02:37But of course when you do move, unless you've really thought it through carefully, then of
02:42course it can lead to a whole lot of paradoxes and consequences.
02:45And of course the reality is that kids who are sort of pretty tech savvy, kids will find
02:49a way around this through the sort of the VPN, the virtual private network, which looks as
02:55if they're sort of coming from a different country.
02:56Maybe they have a sort of a different sort of law.
03:00And of course, let's face it, the only country that has tried this, and of course we sort of
03:04look at what has been done there, is Australia, and in Australia they found that there's been
03:09limited success.
03:10So, okay, for sure, yeah, we're building upon that.
03:13And of course it's a work in progress.
03:15And also remember, many of the sort of providers, they are sort of in the sort of the cloud,
03:19in the sort of the virtual world.
03:22You have limited control on them.
03:24So it's really, really difficult.
03:26Supporters say the ban would give children more time away from platforms they argue
03:32were not designed around young people's well-being.
03:35Ministers say technology companies have had years to make online spaces safer.
03:41But the companies themselves say a blanket ban could cut children off from useful communities,
03:47learning and support, and may even push them towards anonymous or less regulated services.
03:54The government is also looking at limits on live streaming, stranger contact, infinite
03:59scrolling and possible curfews.
04:02There is no doubt that sort of finding a sort of method, if you like, of limiting sort of
04:06the ability of children to spend endless time on these things is no bad thing.
04:11But it's not without challenges.
04:13And I speak as someone who's been through this with sort of, you know, I have some grown-up
04:16sons, and I know it was very difficult in some cases to get them off the computer and
04:20their phones, because, of course, that's the nature of children.
04:23And indeed, the problem also is, of course, that if you make something which, of course,
04:27becomes illicit, then, of course, it becomes all the more desirable.
04:31But hey, you know, we've done it with alcohol, we've done it with cigarettes, we do it with
04:35drugs.
04:36So just because it's difficult doesn't mean to say that we don't try.
04:38But, of course, as I say, it'll take time to sort of list a bed in.
04:42Well, the next stage is not whether ministers want the ban.
04:45It's whether the rules can be made clear, enforceable and safe in practice.
04:51Regulations are expected before Christmas with implementation plan for spring 2027.
04:58Until the detail is published, parents, schools, youth services and technology companies will
05:04be left working through the same central question.
05:07How far can a legal ban change what children actually do online?
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