<\/p>\n
ISTANBUL (AP) \u2014 Turkish lawmakers kicked off a debate Tuesday on a draft law package that includes restricting access to social media platforms for children under 15, making Turkey the latest country to seek measures<\/a> to protect young people from dangerous online activity.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n If it becomes law, the bill would force social media platforms to install age\u2011verification systems, provide parental control tools and require companies to rapidly respond to content deemed harmful. It\u2019s unclear how long the parliament debate will last.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan<\/a> \u2019s government says the proposal aims to mitigate the online risks to children\u2019s safety and privacy.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cProtecting our children from all kinds of risks, threats and harmful content is our top priority,\u201d Mahinur Ozdemir Goktas, Turkey’s minister for family and social services, said earlier this year.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n The main opposition party \u2014 Republican People’s Party or CHP \u2014 has criticized the proposal, saying children should be protected \u201cnot with bans but with rights-based policies.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Under the draft proposal, digital platforms \u2014 such as YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram and others \u2014 would have to block children under 15 from opening accounts and introduce parental controls that would manage children’s access.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Online game companies will also be required to appoint a representative in Turkey to ensure they abide by the new regulations. Potential penalties include internet bandwidth reductions and fines imposed by Turkey\u2019s communications watchdog.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n The Turkish government has a recent record of restricting online platforms as they have grown as a means of expressing dissent. Online communications were widely restricted during last year\u2019s protests<\/a> in support of Istanbul\u2019s jailed opposition mayor, Ekrem Imamoglu<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Restrictions on social media access for children under 16<\/a> first began in December in Australia, where social media companies revoked access to about 4.7 million accounts<\/a> identified as belonging to children.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Last month, Indonesia began implementing a new government regulation<\/a> banning children younger than 16 from access to digital platforms that could expose them to pornography, cyberbullying, online scams and addiction.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Some other countries \u2014 including Spain<\/a>, France<\/a> and the United Kingdom<\/a> \u2014 are also taking or considering measures to restrict children\u2019s access to social media amid growing concern that they are being harmed by exposure to unregulated social media content.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" ISTANBUL (AP) \u2014 Turkish lawmakers kicked off a debate Tuesday on a draft law package that includes restricting access to social media platforms for children under 15, making Turkey the latest country to seek measures to protect young people from dangerous online activity. If it becomes law, the bill would force social media platforms to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":423727,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[188,183,46617,185,186,187,184,46619,46618,2751,189,150,182,190,46620],"class_list":["post-423715","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-technology","tag-blockchain-tech","tag-blockchain-technology","tag-children-under-15","tag-crypto-technology","tag-cryptocurrency-technology","tag-metaverse-technology","tag-nft-technology","tag-online-risks","tag-parental-control-tools","tag-social-media-platforms","tag-soul-bound-token","tag-tech","tag-technology","tag-token-technology","tag-turkeys-government"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dripp.zone\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/423715","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dripp.zone\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dripp.zone\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dripp.zone\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dripp.zone\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=423715"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dripp.zone\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/423715\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":423728,"href":"https:\/\/dripp.zone\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/423715\/revisions\/423728"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dripp.zone\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/423727"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dripp.zone\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=423715"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dripp.zone\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=423715"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dripp.zone\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=423715"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}