Kids Online Health and Safety Task Force Announces Recommendations and Best Practices for Safe Internet Use

Monday, July 22, 2024

Recommendations advance the President's Unity Agenda and underscore the Biden-Harris Administration's efforts to address the ongoing youth mental health crisis

The Biden-Harris Administration's Kids Online Health and Safety Task Force, co-led by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' (HHS) Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) and the U.S. Department of Commerce's (DOC) National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), released a new report today with recommendations and best practices for safer social media and online platform use for youth. The recommendations in the report, Online Health and Safety for Children and Youth: Best Practices for Families and Guidance for Industry, underscore the Administration's efforts to address the ongoing youth mental health crisis and support the President's Unity Agenda for the nation. Task Force members also committed to future actions, including providing more resources for kids, teenagers and families, guidance for pediatricians and conducting more research.

"Across the Biden-Harris Administration, we are committed to combatting the youth mental health crisis in this country and ensuring Americans have the tools and support they need to thrive online," said U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo. "As more and more of kids' time is spent online, this administration is taking steps to protect their privacy and mental health. The recommendations in our report will chart a path toward an Internet that works for everyone."

"President Biden has made addressing the youth mental health crisis a top priority. That's why we are taking steps to ensure the safety and well-being of young people when they use social media and online platforms," said HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra. "The Biden-Harris Administration has whole-of-government approach to protect the mental health, safety, and privacy of youth online, but it will take more than government alone to achieve results."

Approximately 95% of teenagers, and 40% of children between the ages of eight and 12 years old, use some form of social media. Digital technology use can both benefit young people's well-being and expose them to significant harm. Social media use has been associated with risks to physical and mental health, including exposure to bullying, online harassment and abuse, discrimination, and child sexual exploitation. And adolescents who seek out information about health and safety topics online risk encountering inaccurate information that can be unhelpful or actively dangerous.

The report released today provides a summary of the risks and benefits of social media on the health, safety, and privacy of young people; best practices for parents and caregivers; recommended practices for industry; a research agenda; and suggested future work, including for the federal government. Youth advocates, civil society organizations, academic researchers and other experts provided input into the Task Force's recommendations.

"SAMHSA is focused on helping young people, their parents, caregivers and others to protect their mental health when using social media and online platforms," said Task Force Co-Chair Miriam E. Delphin-Rittmon, Ph.D., HHS Assistant Secretary for Mental Health and Substance Use and the leader of SAMHSA. "We know that while there are some benefits to using this technology, such as building connections and supportive communities, there is also substantial cause for concern, and we want to reduce the potential harms as much as possible so that young people can thrive."

"As young people spend more of their lives online, it is past time to act and do more to protect them," said Task Force Co-Chair Alan Davidson, Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Communications and Information and NTIA Administrator. "This Task Force report outlines practices and design choices that companies can implement today to prioritize the privacy of kids, their well-being. and their ability to thrive online. Our report suggests changes that will help young people safely navigate and enjoy all the benefits the Internet offers, while minimizing the risks they face."

Resources for Parents and Caregivers

The best practices and resources for parents and caregivers includes an overarching framework, strategies for parents and caregivers, handouts, and conversation-starters to help engage children in conversations about online platforms and technology use, and a compendium of resources for parents and caregivers. Many of these materials were developed in coordination with the SAMHSA-funded Center of Excellence on Social Media and Youth Mental Health run by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP).

"The American Academy of Pediatrics supports the Kids Online Safety Task Force report released today and commends SAMHSA and the Department of Commerce for addressing the impact of social media on youth mental health," said Dr. Megan Moreno, co-Medical Director of the SAMHSA-funded AAP Center of Excellence on Social Media and Youth Mental Health. "To help make the report's recommendations accessible and actionable, we've published new resources for families and those who work with them, including conversation starters and activities to help parents and caregivers know what to say and how to begin building foundational skills. We are pleased to be a strong partner in this work."

In collaboration with the Kids Online Health and Safety Task Force, the AAP Center of Excellence on Social Media and Youth Mental Health is also launching a variety of new web content, including: recommended best practices resources by topic and/or audience; a series of age-based handouts for parents that pediatricians and others can distribute at well-check visits; new clinical case examples for pediatricians and other clinicians demonstrating how to integrate conversations about media use into health consultations with teen patients; and expanded content specifically for teens.

Industry Recommendations

The Task Force identified 10 recommended practices for online service providers to implement to develop and operate their platforms with youth well-being in mind. Companies make design choices that shape kids' online experiences, and those choices can contribute to, or alleviate harms. This report urges industry to make design choices that prioritize kids' well-being. This includes guidance on ways to:

• Design age-appropriate experiences for youth users;
• Make privacy protections for youth the default;
• Reduce and remove features that encourage excessive or problematic use by youth;
• Limit "likes" and social comparison features for youth by default;
• Develop and deploy mechanisms and strategies to counter child sexual exploitation and abuse;
• Disclose accurate and comprehensive safety-related information about apps;
• Improve systems to address bias and discrimination that youth experience online;
• Use data-driven methods to detect and prevent cyberbullying, and other forms of online harassment and abuse;
• Provide age-appropriate parental control tools that are easy to understand and use; and
• Make data accessible for verified, qualified, and independent research.

Research Agenda

The research agenda includes: overarching objectives that include the need for continued study of the harms associated with online platform use; development and evaluation of scalable interventions to protect children's online health, safety, and privacy; broadening access to platform data and algorithms; and taking a developmental perspective in studying the impacts of online platforms on children's well-being. The research agenda includes specific research topics and domains of interests as they relate to mental and physical health and well-being, safety, and privacy. These include research using comparisons for well-being across different age groups, on efforts to address online safety, and into the effects of ubiquitous computer use in schools. Additionally, there are a set of research approaches that have also been highlighted including the need to include a broad spectrum of online platforms and spaces, focus on casual and interpretivist research, include new methods of assessing what data are collected and with whom data are shared (including through monetization processes), and engaging youth.

Next Steps

The report concludes with recommended next steps for policymakers, including:

• Enacting bipartisan federal legislation to protect youth health, safety, and privacy online;
• Advancing industry action to implement age-appropriate health, safety, and privacy best practices on online platforms through federal legislation and voluntary commitments;
• Working to require access to platform data for independent researchers in privacy-preserving ways;
• Providing support for research into youth privacy, health, and safety online;
• Promoting youth voices in solution setting;
• Supporting access to new and updated resources tailored for youth, parents, health providers, educators, and online platforms; and
• Engaging in international efforts to collaborate on online safety.

About the Kids Online Health and Safety Task Force

The interagency Kids Online Health and Safety Task Force was announced in May 2023 by the Biden-Harris Administration to strengthen protections for children's privacy, health, and safety online. The Task Force is comprised of leadership from HHS, DOC, the Departments of Education, Homeland Security, Justice, the Executive Office of the President and a representative from the Federal Trade Commission. The Task Force builds on prior work across the federal government, including the 2023 U.S. Surgeon General's Advisory on Social Media and Youth Mental Health.

The Task Force is a collaborative initiative aimed at addressing measures we can take regarding making the use of social media safer. It brings together experts, policymakers, and stakeholders to devise strategies for promoting online safety and mental health awareness among young individuals.

If you or someone you know is struggling or in crisis, help is available. Call or text 988 or chat at 988lifeline.org. To learn how to get support for mental health, drug or alcohol issues, visit FindSupport.gov. If you are ready to locate a treatment facility or provider, you can go directly to FindTreatment.gov or call 800-662-HELP (4357).