Ofcom's draft Children's Safety Code of Practice's emphasis on kids choosing protective tools rather than safety by design and default is not ambitious enough
Tech companies have been wilfully ignoring the protection of the young for decades — The writer is a crossbench peer and expert on digital regulation
Context & Ripple Effects
The critique arrives alongside Ofcom’s broader proposed package on child protection, including [[a:864803|algorithmic changes to reduce children’s exposure to toxic material and stronger age checks]]. Its central objection is not whether safeguards exist, but whether the draft assigns too much responsibility to children to activate them.
It also extends a longer UK regulatory thread: the data watchdog had previously proposed rules against design techniques that steer children in unwanted directions. The unresolved question is whether platform safety rules should require protective defaults or primarily offer user-selected controls.
First-order effects
- Ofcom’s draft code becomes a focal point for pressure to replace optional protective tools with safety-by-design and safety-by-default requirements.
- Platforms covered by the code face scrutiny not only over the availability of controls, but over whether their baseline product design protects young users without requiring them to opt in.
Second-order effects
- If Ofcom tightens the draft, services may need to rework recommendation, account, and age-assurance flows rather than rely on settings menus; that raises the implementation stakes of the regulator’s proposed algorithm and age-check measures.
- The consultation sharpens the practical divide between compliance based on giving users choices and compliance based on demonstrable default protections, influencing how platforms document safety decisions to regulators.
Third-order effects
- The dispute points toward child-safety regulation that treats interface and algorithm design as a regulated distribution layer, rather than placing the burden of risk management on minors.
- If that approach prevails, trust and safety could become a core product-design obligation for platforms, though the eventual balance between mandated defaults and user choice remains dependent on Ofcom’s final code.
The trend: Children’s online-safety policy is moving from disclosure and optional controls toward accountability for the defaults, recommendation systems, and access rules that shape young users’ experience.