As we head into 2024, there may be an pressing name to motion for us all to take steps to guard youth security and privateness on-line and to make sure that know-how  – together with rising applied sciences similar to AI – serves as a constructive drive for the following era. As policymakers and regulators weigh potential measures to assist advance security outcomes within the coming weeks and months, it’s important that they contemplate each the advantages and the dangers of know-how for younger individuals. Based mostly on our experiences, we define three themes for policymakers to contemplate as they work by way of initiatives to guard youth security and privateness on-line, in addition to Microsoft’s place on these points.

Microsoft’s strategy to on-line security

At Microsoft, our aim is to empower younger individuals to make use of know-how safely, mindfully, and in pursuit of social, instructional, and financial alternatives. In line with our mission and our commitments, this implies:

• Unlocking the advantages and energy of know-how for all
• Sustaining our longstanding efforts to advance baby on-line security and privateness
• Advancing our understanding of how know-how and baby well-being intersect

We’ve lengthy acknowledged that now we have a accountability to help protected on-line experiences for our customers, together with youth, and to contribute to a safer on-line ecosystem. This requires us to steadiness youth rights thoughtfully and holistically, together with freedom of expression, entry to info, privateness, and safety. There isn’t any one-size-fits-all strategy; interventions to guard youth from dangerous on-line content material or conduct or their knowledge ought to be tailor-made to the service or function, and to the hurt we’re in search of to deal with.

Key themes for policymakers to give attention to in 2024 and past 

1. Expertise is important to allow younger individuals to unlock social, instructional, and financial alternatives.

Coverage and regulatory measures ought to protect the advantages of know-how for younger individuals and allow them to take part totally of their communities. Expertise has been proven to:

• Create social alternatives: It allows younger individuals to attach with others, entry numerous assets and views, and discover help and knowledge on-line
• Present instructional advantages: It will probably improve entry to studying alternatives, assist numerous learners thrive, and assist younger individuals develop abilities for the digital future
• Create financial alternatives: Mastering computing and AI abilities will change into more and more important for a lot of careers throughout your entire financial system. Expertise may empower younger individuals to create and innovate, with instruments similar to generative AI

Nonetheless, we additionally acknowledge that know-how can have destructive impacts on younger individuals’s well-being, and that these impacts usually are not evenly distributed: Some younger individuals could also be extra susceptible or marginalized than others. These dangers can also change as know-how evolves.

2. Empowering younger individuals to make use of know-how safely and mindfully requires age-appropriate experiences however age assurance strategies have trade-offs.

We’d like to have the ability to determine the ages of our customers to guard towards potential hurt. Understanding a consumer is underneath a sure age can allow the applying of various content material insurance policies, privateness settings, household security options, or the supply of age-appropriate content material.

Nonetheless, there are challenges and tradeoffs in implementing strong age assurance processes. There may be at present no clear technical answer to age assurance that achieves the accuracy wanted to successfully determine or confirm a consumer’s age with out risking trade-offs similar to potential safety, privateness, and human rights dangers. Along with contemplating how we are able to construct an interoperable and frictionless consumer expertise, conversations are underway throughout trade on methods to mitigate the next:

• Privateness and safety dangers, similar to gathering and processing delicate private knowledge
• Fairness and entry challenges, similar to excluding or discriminating towards sure teams of customers
• Civil rights and authorities surveillance issues, similar to undermining on-line anonymity and freedom of expression
• Person expertise points, similar to creating limitations or delays to entry on-line companies

Microsoft is exploring completely different age assurance strategies, enabling us to be taught and enhance our practices and options. We’re partaking with technical and different organizations such because the Worldwide Group for Standardization (ISO) to assist develop frameworks to help interoperable and privacy-protective age assurance applied sciences.

However we additionally want the help and steering of policymakers, regulators, and different specialists to assist navigate these trade-offs and discover good options which might be each efficient and respect elementary rights. We additionally need to work with specialists to deepen our understanding of how age info ought to inform completely different interventions throughout completely different companies and options, in addition to the place we are able to appropriately provide options with out age verification measures.

3. We should proceed to develop the required proof base to design know-how and insurance policies to advance youth well-being.

We have to consistently replace and enhance our understanding of how know-how impacts younger individuals’s well-being, and the way we are able to design know-how and insurance policies to finest help and shield them. Extra analysis is rising about the usage of social media, however we see a necessity for added, medically knowledgeable analysis to know the impression of various on-line companies on youth psychological well being, improvement, and studying.

We encourage stakeholders and specialists to put money into additional analysis on numerous matters, similar to constructing understanding of how youth interact with completely different sorts of know-how, the impression of limiting entry to know-how, whether or not some options or content material could be extra appropriately restricted than others, and the potential to leverage know-how to ship psychological well being interventions. To help this, on Safer Web Day we are going to publish the most recent outcomes from our annual client analysis.

And, all through, there’s a must heart youth voices and views – we can not meet our targets with out understanding what younger individuals need and wish from know-how.

Our help for regulatory measures

Regulatory measures such because the EU Digital Companies Act are driving systemic modifications in how trade approaches digital security. We help the event of tailor-made, considerate measures that may help younger individuals to have interaction safely on-line and commend the great practices beginning to emerge globally. Microsoft helps:

• Danger-based approaches, tailor-made to particular on-line companies and options: We help regulatory approaches that clearly differentiate between distinctive on-line companies and leverage danger or impression assessments to ship efficient mitigations for dangers to kids and younger individuals within the design or operation of these companies.
• Clearly outlined harms and duties: The place proposals incorporate an obligation of care to deal with potential harms to kids, we encourage policymakers to supply readability on what’s required to discharge these duties and to obviously outline the harms at concern, primarily based on scientific analysis.
• Final result-based approaches: To allow a service-specific strategy that helps the rights and finest pursuits of the kid, we welcome regulatory approaches that target guaranteeing the techniques and processes are in place to mitigate danger and construct in improved privateness protections for kids and teenagers.
• Regulatory harmonization and interoperability: To help seamless on-line experiences, we encourage ongoing regulatory cooperation and harmonization, together with between privateness and security regulators, and worldwide regulators.
• Offering parental guardrails: The place acceptable to the service, we help necessities to supply dad and mom and caregivers with strong instruments that allow them to decide on guardrails to handle their baby’s on-line experiences.

We welcome the chance to additional interact with specialists, policymakers, and regulators to help the event of a safer on-line ecosystem for younger individuals.

Tags: AI, baby on-line safety, EU Digital Service Act, On-line Security, Safer Web Day