Child rights body nears final draft of social media safety guidelines for children

New Delhi: The National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) is in the final stretch of drafting guidelines for social media and online gaming platforms to improve child safety, holding its “final stakeholder meeting” with companies on Thursday, the commission said in a statement. It is aiming to release the final guidelines in the first half of 2027, according to an official familiar with the development.India NewsHT was the first to report in August, this year that the child rights commission was preparing the framework, which officials had earlier described as a uniform code of conduct for social media platforms to strengthen safeguards for children, using platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, X and Snapchat.At Thursday’s meeting, representatives of social media and online gaming companies made presentations on their existing child safety tools, awareness programmes for children, parents and caregivers, and their plans for further measures, the NCPCR statement said.An NCPCR official, requesting anonymity, said, “The draft guidelines will be published for public comments in December, with NCPCR aiming to release the final guidelines in the first half of 2027. Sixteen companies participated in Thursday’s consultation, including Meta, Google, Snapchat, ShareChat, Reddit and gaming platform Roblox.”“What the guidelines are trying to do is mitigate legal activities that platforms do but yet are harmful for the children. Like scrolling reels which make people addicted, and algorithms that may repeatedly show harmful content. These are legal but harmful,” the official added.Before the meeting, the commission prepared a checklist of proposed child safety measures, called the ‘Child Safety Implementation Matrix’. Platforms were asked to indicate whether each safeguard was already in place, whether they planned to introduce it and whether they had any additional suggestions, it said.The matrix covers safety by design, age assurance and age-appropriate experiences, protection of children’s data, detection and enforcement against child sexual exploitation and abuse material (CSEAM), anti-addictive design and digital wellbeing, reporting and time-bound redressal, and empowerment of children and parents, among other measures.“The initiative assumes significance in view of the increasing use of digital platforms by children and concerns relating to exposure to harmful and age-inappropriate content, cyberbullying, online grooming, Child Sexual Exploitation and Abuse Material (CSEAM), privacy violations and other forms of online exploitation. These concerns highlight the need for stronger safeguards, greater awareness and enhanced accountability of digital platforms,” NCPCR said in its release.How the guidelines took shape The consultative process began with a meeting with social media and technology companies on May 22, this year to discuss their existing safety systems, content moderation, complaint handling and awareness measures. The commission subsequently held separate one-on-one consultations with individual companies.On July 24, NCPCR consulted civil society organisations and incorporated their suggestions into the implementation matrix. It held a separate consultation with online gaming platforms on October 19.When HT first reported on the proposed framework, officials said it would function as guidelines rather than a law. However, NCPCR could use its statutory powers under the Commissions for Protection of Child Rights (CPCR) Act to recommend prosecution to the appropriate authorities if it found violations of children’s rights under existing laws, they added.Officials aware of the matter had also said the aim was to make social media safer for children rather than ban their access. Since a law restricting children’s access to social media could take time, the commission wanted platforms to follow a common set of safety standards in the interim. Representatives of Meta, X, Snapchat and ShareChat participated in the consultations, officials had said.The commission said the guidelines are being prepared in consultation with the ministry of electronics and information technology (MeitY), the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) and the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (14C).The NCPCR exercise is running alongside the Centre’s discussions on children’s online safety. On August 21, HT reported on a closed-door consultation held by the IT ministry with civil society groups, where participants unanimously agreed that a blanket ban on social media for children would not work.Three possible approaches were discussed at that meeting — introducing a new chapter in the Information Technology Act, enacting a separate law, or issuing guidelines through NCPCR. Several groups called for “safety by design” and a legally enforceable “duty of care” for platforms, which is a legal obligation on platforms to take reasonable steps to prevent harm to children, rather than acting only after the harm is done. “Safety by design” is now among the principles in NCPCR’s matrix.