UK and US issue joint statement pledging closer cooperation on children’s online safety

On 10 October 2024, the UK and US governments issued a joint statement announcing the formation of a new joint children’s online safety working group, which highlights the parallels between the approaches of the two countries to protecting children online. The group aims to improve education around making safer choices online and to strengthen the protection of children through the use of age-appropriate safeguards, while maximising the benefits they can gain from using online services. The group will work with national institutions and organisations, as well as international partners, in support of these aims.

The statement refers to the need for further research on the impact of excessive social media and smartphone use on children and young people, with statistics showing children actively engaging with social media daily from an early age and smartphone ownership being nearly universal amongst teenagers in both the UK and the US. It also promotes greater transparency from online platforms and the need for research on the impacts of new technologies, such as GenAI, to keep up with their development. 

The statement acknowledges that a safety, privacy and inclusivity-by-design approach is paramount to promoting children’s safety and wellbeing online and highlights particular measures that could be implemented to this effect, while noting the need to ensure that human rights are still respected. This includes measures to prevent promotion of harmful content, improved reporting on content moderation, strong default privacy settings and restrictions on targeted advertising. 

Children’s online safety is a clear priority for both the UK and the US: the UK’s Online Safety Act, which will gradually enter into force from December, places duties on online platforms to protect children’s safety and to implement measures to mitigate the risk of them suffering harm. Likewise, the US has launched the Kids Online Health and Safety Task Force to advance the health, safety and privacy of children online.