UK plans default midnight social media curfew for teens aged 16-17

By Muvija M

LONDON, July 15 (Reuters) - Older teenagers in Britain will have to switch the settings on social media apps to be able to use them after midnight under new safeguarding rules planned by the government.

A month after it announced plans to introduce a sweeping ban on social media for young people under 16, the government said on Tuesday it also planned a default overnight curfew for young people aged 16 and 17.

Affected users would be blocked from using the apps between midnight and 6 a.m. unless they change the default setting. Features designed to keep users scrolling would also be switched off by default.

The curbs underline global concerns among parents and policymakers about safeguarding young people from the harmful effects of social media on their mental and physical health.

"These measures will be crucial in helping young people get the sleep they need, focus on school and college, and spend more quality time with family and friends," technology minister Liz Kendall said.

Online safety minister Kanishka Narayan said tech companies would be legally required to implement the curfew.

"We're forcing the tech companies to do it," he told LBC Radio on Wednesday.

He said the companies had a liability to do more robust age checks and that those that fail to do so would face "very severe regulatory sanction".

Instagram owner Meta, TikTok parent ByteDance and Google, which owns YouTube, did not immediately respond to Reuters requests for comment on the curbs.

Opposition Conservative Party education policy chief Laura Trott called the plans a mess.

"Either they think 16- and 17-year-olds should be on social media or they don't, but curfews they can simply switch off won't achieve anything," she said.

The first set of regulations on social media restrictions will be laid before parliament by the end of this year, with measures expected to come into force in spring 2027, the government said.

A team that advised Australia — the first country to ban social media for children — found that online platforms were stumbling at the very first step of implementing age-verification checks, rendering the ban ineffective.

Google and TikTok have in the last month separately settled a U.S. lawsuit brought by a minor who claimed that social media platforms damaged his mental health.

(Reporting by Muvija M, Editing by William James and Timothy Heritage)