"The report, The Online Safety Act: Are Children Safer Online?, published by Britain's leading not-for-profit for online child safety, examines the early impact of the U.K.'s Online Safety Act on families. While new safety measures are becoming more visible across children's online spaces, the systems meant to enforce them are widely seen as weak and easy to circumvent."
"Nearly half of children report experiencing harm online, including exposure to violent and hateful content, despite the Act's protections having come into force. The research, which surveyed 1,270 U.K. children aged 9-16 and their parents, found nearly one-third (32%) of children admitted to bypassing age checks in just a two-month period."
"The most common method was simply entering a fake birthday (13%), followed by using someone else's login (9%) or using someone else's device (8%). Others used a VPN or submitted photos and videos of other people, or even fictional characters, to trick facial age-estimation tools."
A report from Internet Matters reveals that one-third of U.K. children have found ways to circumvent age verification systems online. Despite the implementation of the Online Safety Act, many children report experiencing online harm. The report indicates that common methods for bypassing age checks include entering fake birthdays, using borrowed logins, and even altering physical appearance. The U.K. government is considering further restrictions on social media for under-16s as concerns about children's online safety grow.
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