UK to ban social media for kids under 16, may impose overnight curfews
UK to ban social media for kids under 16, may impose overnight curfews
英国将禁止16岁以下青少年使用社交媒体，并可能实施夜间宵禁
The UK government announced today that it will ban social media for all kids under the age of 16 in rules expected to take effect in spring 2027. The ban will apply to platforms including Snapchat, TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, and X. 英国政府今日宣布，将禁止所有16岁以下青少年使用社交媒体，相关规定预计将于2027年春季生效。该禁令将适用于Snapchat、TikTok、YouTube、Instagram、Facebook和X等平台。
“We’re going further than any country in the world by banning social media for under-16s and putting wider protections in place to give kids their childhood back,” Prime Minister Keir Starmer said in the announcement. 英国首相基尔·斯塔默（Keir Starmer）在公告中表示：“我们通过禁止16岁以下青少年使用社交媒体并实施更广泛的保护措施，走在了全球各国的前列，旨在将童年还给孩子们。”
In addition to the ban on social media, Starmer’s government said it will impose “world-leading blocks on harmful functions such as livestreaming and stranger communication with children for under-16s… Restrictions on these functionalities will also be on by default for 16- and 17-year-olds to prevent a cliff-edge at 16.” The livestreaming and stranger-contact rules would apply to a range of services, such as online gaming. 除了社交媒体禁令外，斯塔默政府表示，将针对16岁以下青少年实施“全球领先的有害功能拦截措施，例如直播和与陌生人交流……对于16岁和17岁的青少年，这些功能也将默认开启限制，以防止他们在年满16岁时面临断崖式的监管缺失。”直播和陌生人联系规则将适用于包括网络游戏在内的多种服务。
“The government will also be looking in more detail at overnight curfews and breaks in infinite scrolling for under-18-year-olds and will set out more detail in July,” the announcement said. The planned social media ban will not apply to messaging services like WhatsApp and Signal. 公告称：“政府还将更深入地研究针对18岁以下青少年的夜间宵禁和无限滚动浏览中断机制，并将在7月公布更多细节。”计划中的社交媒体禁令将不适用于WhatsApp和Signal等即时通讯服务。
Another planned change is that “so-called AI ‘romantic companion’ chatbots—designed to simulate sexual relationships or roleplay with users—will have to enforce a minimum age of 18. Similar intimate functionalities will be restricted for under-18s on AI chatbots more widely,” the UK government said. 英国政府表示，另一项计划中的变更是：“所谓的AI‘浪漫伴侣’聊天机器人——旨在模拟性关系或与用户进行角色扮演——必须强制执行18岁的最低年龄限制。在更广泛的AI聊天机器人领域，类似的亲密功能也将对18岁以下人群进行限制。”
Age checks
年龄核验
Platforms will be ordered to verify users’ ages. Communications regulator Ofcom will be tasked with determining what kinds of age-verification systems will be required to comply with the rules. The ban decision was made after a consultation that drew responses from 116,000 people. 各平台将被要求核实用户年龄。英国通信管理局（Ofcom）将负责确定符合规则所需的年龄核验系统类型。这项禁令是在经过一项吸引了11.6万人参与的咨询后做出的。
“Ofcom will set out in the coming months different options for effective forms of age assurance for proving whether someone is over 16 that are accurate, robust, reliable, and fair,” the government said in a fact sheet on the rules, noting that facial recognition may be part of the age-check scheme. Adults can avoid the new age check on their existing social media accounts if they’ve already proven their age in another way. 政府在关于该规则的情况说明书中表示：“Ofcom将在未来几个月内提出多种有效的年龄保证方案，以证明某人是否年满16岁，这些方案必须准确、稳健、可靠且公平。”说明书还指出，人脸识别可能成为年龄核验方案的一部分。如果成年人已经通过其他方式证明了自己的年龄，则可以避免在其现有的社交媒体账户上进行新的年龄核验。
The UK Online Safety Act already requires age checks for porn and other sensitive content. When it took effect last year, it appeared that many people in the UK used VPNs (virtual private networks) to circumvent the age verification. VPNs themselves can create privacy and security problems. 英国《在线安全法案》此前已要求对色情及其他敏感内容进行年龄核验。该法案去年生效时，英国许多人似乎使用了VPN（虚拟专用网络）来规避年龄核验。而VPN本身可能会带来隐私和安全问题。
“The VPNs that children are incentivized to use pose privacy and security risks. Bad actors in the VPN space often trade in the sensitive browsing data that these tools can gather,” said the Center for European Policy Analysis, a research group whose funders include Google and Meta. “孩子们被诱导使用的VPN存在隐私和安全风险。VPN领域的恶意行为者经常交易这些工具所收集的敏感浏览数据，”欧洲政策分析中心（Center for European Policy Analysis）表示，该研究机构的资助者包括谷歌和Meta。
UK modeled rule on Australia ban
英国效仿澳大利亚的禁令模式
The UK government today said the social media ban will use the same model as Australia, where online platforms must pay financial penalties if they fail to block underage users. Social media companies criticized the Australian rules but agreed to comply. 英国政府今日表示，该社交媒体禁令将采用与澳大利亚相同的模式，即在线平台如果未能拦截未成年用户，必须支付罚款。社交媒体公司批评了澳大利亚的规则，但同意遵守。
YouTube said in a statement to media outlets today that “blanket bans push kids out of such curated, supervised, beneficial experiences and towards anonymous, less-safe services.” Meta said the similar rule in Australia showed that “bans risk isolating teens from online communities and information, and driving them to unregulated alternatives that lack built-in protections and parental controls.” YouTube今日在给媒体的声明中表示：“一刀切的禁令将孩子们推离了那些经过策划、监管且有益的体验，转而投向匿名且安全性较低的服务。”Meta则表示，澳大利亚的类似规则表明，“禁令有导致青少年与在线社区和信息隔绝的风险，并迫使他们转向缺乏内置保护和家长控制的非监管替代平台。”
The Electronic Frontier Foundation has said that age-verification requirements harm privacy by requiring more collection of personal information from users of all ages. Banning social media also prevents kids from accessing useful content, the group said. 电子前沿基金会（EFF）表示，年龄核验要求通过收集所有年龄段用户更多的个人信息，损害了隐私。该组织称，禁止社交媒体也阻碍了孩子们获取有益内容。
“Beyond being spaces where people can share funny videos and engage with enjoyable content, social media enables young people to engage with the world in a way that transcends their in-person realm, as well as find information they may not feel safe to access offline, such as about family abuse or their sexuality,” the EFF said in March as the UK discussions were progressing. “In severing this connection to people and information by banning social media, politicians are forcing millions of young people into a dark and censored world.” “社交媒体不仅是人们分享搞笑视频和参与有趣内容的场所，它还使年轻人能够以超越现实生活的方式与世界互动，并找到他们在现实中可能不敢获取的信息，例如关于家庭虐待或性取向的信息，”EFF在3月英国讨论进行时曾表示，“通过禁止社交媒体切断这种与人及信息的联系，政客们正在将数百万年轻人推向一个黑暗且受审查的世界。”
Liberal Democrats prefer age-rating system
自由民主党倾向于年龄分级系统
MP Victoria Collins of the Liberal Democrats party said the proposal is “woefully inadequate.” The UK should instead force tech companies to address addictive algorithms and harmful content, she said. 自由民主党议员维多利亚·柯林斯（Victoria Collins）表示，该提案“极其不足”。她认为，英国应该转而强制科技公司解决成瘾性算法和有害内容问题。
“That’s why the Liberal Democrats put forward a social media age-rating system that, instead of a blanket ban, puts the onus on the social media giants to clean up their act and have safety by design for all of us,” she said. “这就是为什么自由民主党提出了一个社交媒体年龄分级系统，而不是一刀切的禁令，该系统将责任归咎于社交媒体巨头，要求他们规范自身行为，并为我们所有人提供‘设计即安全’的保障，”她说。
MP Nigel Farage, leader of the right-wing Reform UK party, said “the social media ban is well-intentioned” but is “unlikely to work given the mass adoption of VPNs. It will also mean the introduction of Digital ID via the back door. The real answer here is handsets for children with limited features.” 右翼英国改革党领袖奈杰尔·法拉奇（Nigel Farage）议员表示，“社交媒体禁令初衷是好的”，但“考虑到VPN的广泛使用，它不太可能奏效。这也意味着通过后门引入数字身份（Digital ID）。真正的解决之道是为儿童提供功能受限的手机。”
Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch took credit for Starmer’s Labour Party deciding on an under-16 ban. “It is fantastic news that the government has finally woken up to the dangers of social media for young people… Huge credit goes to MP Laura Trott and my Shadow Cabinet for relentlessly fighting for this. Conservatives welcome this latest Labour U-turn, and will continue to work for the best implementation of the policy,” Badenoch said. 保守党领袖凯米·巴德诺赫（Kemi Badenoch）将斯塔默领导的工党决定实施16岁以下禁令归功于自己。“政府终于意识到社交媒体对年轻人的危害，这是一个极好的消息……劳拉·特罗特（Laura Trott）议员和我的影子内阁为争取这一目标进行了不懈的斗争，功不可没。保守党欢迎工党这次最新的政策转向，并将继续致力于该政策的最佳实施，”巴德诺赫说。