Labour Digital Rights Network

📝 Our response to last night's announcement. ⤵️

Before the shutdowns, over 10 million Iranians relied on the internet for work. Now, the entire country is trying to reach the uncensored internet and resume normal life. We're moving as fast we possibly can to help you make that happen. We are with you.

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🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿Scotland's Children’s Commissioner agrees with us: banning under-16s from social media "won't keep children safe". Following a children’s rights impact assessment, Nicola Killean has concluded that a blanket ban is the wrong approach. Why? Because it completely ignores the root cause of the crisis. A ban does nothing to fix the exploitative algorithms, and business models that drive harmful content. Crucially, she highlights the devastating impact of digital exile on the most vulnerable. Any ban would disproportionately isolate disabled children, those in rural areas, and young people who rely on online communities for support with their identity. Social media plays a vital role in children's lives, supporting communication, self-expression, and connection with support networks. We cannot rip away these lifelines just to make it look like politicians are "doing something". We must listen to the experts. The government must focus on platform accountability and cracking down on harmful, addictive design features. Read more ⤵️ bbc.co.uk/news/articles/…

The risks posed by social media to children’s safety stem from platform design and practices that prioritize profit at all costs. Addressing them through regulation and human rights can take us further than blanket bans. More in my Office's new guidelines: ohchr.org/sites/default/…

🚨The UN's top human rights body has just issued a stark warning to governments rushing to ban teens from social media: blanket bans are not the answer. In a major new intervention, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights has published 10 key guidelines for protecting children online. Their message is clear: blanket bans push children towards riskier, less monitored corners of the internet while letting tech monopolies completely off the hook. Instead of forcing young people into digital exile, the UN's very first recommendation is exactly what our campaign has been demanding: force platforms to fix their toxic environments. We must curb addictive design features that prioritise corporate profit over user wellbeing. Crucially, the UN reminds us that children have fundamental digital rights. They have the right to access information, express themselves, and participate in the modern public square. We cannot strip away these rights and sever their digital lifelines simply to compensate for the deliberate safety failures of Big Tech. These guidelines also warn against the severe privacy risks of mass age verification, demanding strict guardrails to prevent the misuse of personal data. We cannot protect children by forcing the entire population to hand over sensitive digital IDs or biometric face scans just to get online. It is time for our government to listen to the evidence, the experts, and the international community. 🔗Read the full UN guidelines on online safety via the link in our bio.

🔴NEWS: Scotland's children's commissioner warns that a social media ban "WON'T keep children safe." A social media ban for under 16s would not only fail to deliver on its promise but it would come at a cost to our privacy by introducing digital ID by the backdoor. The answer lies in better parental controls & thoughtful tech responsibility, not government-imposed bans. Read⤵️ bbc.co.uk/news/articles/…

Navigating the digital world as a parent is daunting, especially on top of the everyday economic pressures families are facing. But we must resist the "easy fix" of outsourcing the hard work of parental guidance and supervision to the state. Social media platforms already offer extensive controls to help parents limit access to inappropriate content and manage their children's online safety. Imposing a blanket ban does not solve the problem - as the evidence from Australia now makes abundantly clear: prohibition is failing. Instead of forcing children into digital exile, we must build digital resilience. We need to equip young people with the education and digital literacy required to navigate the online world with genuine agency.

"I don't think an Australian model of an all out ban is the right way to go at this point." Social media consultant @MattNavarra speaks to @skysarahjane about whether the UK should impose a social media ban for under-16s. #TUKT trib.al/MUXXPeQ 📺 Sky 501 and YouTube

🆔A social media ban = “digital ID checkpoints for the whole population,” @silkiecarlo warns on @Channel4 We must avoid anything like a digital ID system for the internet that would both eradicate privacy online & fail to keep children safe. The fight isn't over yet - stay updated⤵️ bigbrotherwatch.org.uk/subscribe/

Imagine a stranger sitting across from you on a train. Through their glasses, they could see your name, your social media, your mutual friends and where you work, go to school or hang out. This is the world Meta want ⬇️ goodlaw.social/u1v3

#UK: Labour appears set to introduce new limits on children’s access to social media. But banning social media is not the answer. It risks undermining young people’s speech rights while failing to address the real issues. Read Index’s analysis ⬇️ indexoncensorship.org/2026/02/bannin…

🛑 The government's online safety consultation has now closed. A massive thank you to everyone who took the time to engage and make your voice heard to protect our digital rights! While we do not know what the immediate future will bring during these extremely turbulent times for the Labour government, our mission remains unchanged. We will continue to fight for digital rights, privacy, and liberty within the Labour movement.🌹

The U.K. was taking a wait-and-see approach to online safety. Then along came Elon Musk’s AI chatbot Grok. 🔗 politico.eu/article/keir-s…

More than 60% of Australian children still using social media despite ban for under-16s mollyrosefoundation.org/more-than-60-o…

🚨 Could common sense prevail? Focusing on outlawing addictive design features, rather than blanket bans, is exactly the evidence-based approach we need. As we have seen in Australia, prohibition simply does not work: nearly 70% of teens have easily maintained access to their accounts despite restrictions. But even more concerning is the cliff edge a ban creates; plunging 16-year-olds into the online world entirely unprepared once they come of age is the exact opposite of fostering the digital literacy the next generation needs to thrive in an increasingly tech-dominant world. The real problem is not that young people are online, but that platforms use inherently predatory features designed to monopolise our attention and harvest our data. These toxic designs affect users of all ages, not just children. We will never solve this corporate-made crisis by forcing young people into digital exile. Instead, we must demand tech monopolies dismantle the features that proliferate genuine harms in the first place. Target the design, not the access. Read more ⤵️ thetimes.com/uk/technology-…

@wesstreeting argues that just because kids bypass rules, it doesn't mean age limits are pointless, comparing it to underage drinking . But preventing underage drinking doesn't require forcing every adult in the UK to hand over a digital ID or biometric face scan just to enter a pub! Enforcing a social media ban effectively ends the fundamental right to online anonymity, handing Big Tech vast new stockpiles of our personal data. You don't defeat surveillance capitalism by supercharging it.

📵A ban is a cop-out, letting unaccountable tech monopolies completely off the hook. How can it be right to shut teens out of the digital public square, while leaving the toxic engagement-driven algorithms completely untouched for everyone else? If Labour politicians truly want to take on what they call the modern equivalent of Big Tobacco, they cannot rely on lazy bans that punish users and destroy digital privacy for all of us.

🇦🇺This is exactly what we have been warning about. Those championing the failing Australian model here in the UK are either ignoring or deliberately hiding this fundamental truth: you cannot ban teenagers from social media without introducing massive privacy risks for everyone. There is no way to enforce a ban without fundamentally changing everyone's relationship with the digital world, including the death of online anonymity. And the worst part? This sweeping erosion of our digital rights is being done to prop up a policy that isn't even working.

More than half of Brits think a social media ban for under-16s would be ineffective. So why the rush into a fundamentally flawed policy?