The IEEE has gone a long way to improving safety online for children through their standards and guidelines. The IEEE 2089-2021 Standard for an Age Appropriate Digital Services Framework was released in 2021. It provides concrete actions to ensure online products and services are child-friendly. This standard is critical in supporting the delivery of information in formats appropriate for audiences across all ages. At the same time, it protects the rights ensured by the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child.
The IEEE Standards Association
recently made available detailed age-specific standards for designing safe and age-appropriate online spaces for kids. These guidelines reinforce the imperative of developing a safer digital ecosystem.International Collaboration on Online Safety
A panel discussion on online safety, moderated by Konstantinos Karachalios, sparked a lively discussion around the topic. Greece’s Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis and 5Rights Foundation president Baroness Beeban Kidron were the star guests of the event. They called attention to the urgency of regulating online systems. This regulation is a starting point, but it’s crucial to hold these platforms accountable in putting children’s best interests first.
Except as noted by Prime Minister Mitsotakis, the digital space has created serious challenges that must be addressed. He stated, “The models and the algorithms [of the systems] are designed to promote addition,” emphasizing the need for protective measures against manipulative online practices. He further described the current state as an “unprecedented global experiment with the mental health of our children and teenagers,” underscoring the urgency of establishing robust regulations.
Baroness Kidron turned these feelings into action, declaring that “This is a 100 percent engineered world. She stressed the importance of designing digital environments to be appropriate for children, stating, “We have to design the world to be appropriate for children, like we design other environments.” Together, these statements signal a serious commitment to prioritizing the safety of children in the digital space.
Age Verification Systems
This is where the IEEE’s new standard, IEEE 2089.1-2024, comes into play to build upon these efforts. This standard is a necessary step toward establishing a transparent framework for developing, deploying, and evaluating age-verification systems. This standard is critical for allowing organizations the flexibility to accurately and effectively display age-appropriate content while still protecting minors from harmful content.
Jon Labrador, director of conformity assessment for IEEE SA, discussed how age verification can assist organizations in providing content tailored to different age groups. He recognized that instituting strong age verification standards would help facilitate a safer online experience for younger users.
Tony Allen, founder and chief executive of Age Check, established about the verification systems. He stated, “As the digital world continues to evolve, a reliable, secure, and globally recognized framework for verifying the age of online users is essential.” This new framework will equip organizations with a checklist to use so that they can be confident that their offerings are age appropriate and protect children from harmful content.
Global Impact and Future Steps
The ramifications of these standards go beyond Greece. In Asia, Indonesia has been taking the leadership role to implement the first age-appropriate design regulation. This is an excellent precedent for other countries to follow. This represents a developing international consensus that the online environments that children so often navigate require protective measures.
Ravi Subramaniam emphasized the significance of certification programs associated with these standards: “This certification program ensures that age verification systems used by organizations conform to requirements in the standard, thereby ensuring that access to their products and services are made after proper verification.” This certification will instill confidence among parents and guardians regarding their children’s online safety.
As governments worldwide recognize the necessity of creating safer digital environments, the collaboration between organizations like IEEE and national authorities will be pivotal. These discussions and consultations are bound to have an impact on future legislation that will seek to create children’s rights in the digital age.