Lahore/ London, July 16:
Governments in Pakistan and the United Kingdom are moving to tighten restrictions on children’s and teenagers’ use of social media, citing growing concerns over cyberbullying, online abuse, digital addiction and the impact of excessive screen time on young people’s mental health.
In Pakistan, a lawmaker in Punjab has proposed banning children under the age of 16 from creating or maintaining social media accounts without parental consent, while the UK government has announced plans for a voluntary overnight social media curfew for 16- and 17-year-olds and default limits on features designed to encourage prolonged use.
Sarah Ahmad of Pakistan’s Istehkam-e-Pakistan Party (IPP), a coalition partner in the ruling provincial government, on Tuesday submitted a resolution in the Punjab Assembly urging the provincial government to prohibit social media accounts for children under 16 without parental consent.
The resolution, the first of its kind in any provincial or federal legislature in Pakistan, also calls on the federal government to introduce nationwide legislation regulating children’s access to social media and strengthening online safety measures.
Ahmad, who also chairs the Child Protection Bureau Punjab, said unrestricted access to social media has exposed minors to cyberbullying, online sexual exploitation, inappropriate content, psychological distress, digital addiction and other serious online threats.
The resolution recommends that children below 16 should not be allowed to create or maintain social media accounts unless parental or legal guardian consent is obtained through a reliable age-verification mechanism. It also urges the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) to enforce effective age-verification systems across social media platforms operating in the country.
The proposal comes as governments worldwide consider stricter regulations on children’s online activity amid mounting evidence linking excessive social media use to mental health concerns and exposure to harmful content.
In the UK, the government announced on Wednesday that 16- and 17-year-olds will be subject to a voluntary overnight social media curfew. Features that encourage prolonged engagement, such as autoplay videos, will also be disabled by default for older teenagers, although users will be able to change the settings.
The latest proposals follow the government’s announcement last month of a broader social media ban for children under 16, expected to apply from next spring to platforms including Snapchat, TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook and X, while excluding messaging services such as WhatsApp and Signal.