German Chancellor Friedrich Merz is open to a social media ban for minors, he said Wednesday, following moves by Australia and other countries to keep young teens off popular platforms.
Chancellor Merz said he is usually sceptical about prohibitions, but added that “I think the main focus must be on how to protect children at an age when they also need time to play, learn and concentrate at school”.
Speaking on the podcast Machtwechsel, he said his government is considering “various ways of handling it in a more restrictive manner”, including an age limit and forcing platforms to verify users’ ages.
Several nations are toughening up age restrictions on social media platforms as concerns mount that excessive screen time could harm childhood development and mental health.
Australia has since December required TikTok, YouTube, Snapchat and other top social media services to remove accounts held by under-16s, or face heavy fines.
READ ALSO: Will Germany ban social media for children?
Indian IT minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said Tuesday that his country was discussing age-based measures with social media firms, and French lawmakers last month passed a bill to the Senate that would ban social media for under-15s.
Merz also voiced concern about the impact of social media on child development.
“If children today at age 14 have five hours or more of screen time a day, if their entire socialisation takes place only through this medium, then we shouldn’t be surprised by personality deficits and problems in the social behaviour of young people,” he said.
Two dazed kids sit stare at phones in their hands on a Rose Monday float for Carnival. The words on their arms say ‘childhood today’. Photo by INA FASSBENDER / AFP.
Merz said he had “a lot of sympathy” for suggestions from within his conservative CDU that the age limit should be set at 16 but was also open to a proposal from his centre-left SPD coalition partner on a ban for under 14-year-olds, with platforms reconfigured for children.
Some in Germany have sounded a note of caution, warning that bans should not substitute for helping children surf the net more safely.
“Simply banning platforms without empowering young people to critically evaluate content merely shifts the problem — it does not solve it,” Deborah Schnabel of the Anne Frank Educational Centre said.
The far-right AfD’s lawmaker Ruben Rupp accused the SPD of wanting to “wrap children in cotton wool” and argued minors should be “encouraged in an age-appropriate manner to set their own media and communication boundaries”.
Rejecting such proposals, Merz said that “arguing that children need to be introduced to it so they know how to use it properly doesn’t hold water. In that case you would also have to serve alcohol in primary school so they get used to it.”
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