Abstract
Age assurance refers to approaches for determining the age of online users, and as a result, ensuring that children are offered safe and age-appropriate experiences. Governments, technology companies and children’s rights organisations are paying close attention to age assurance as a key tool in providing a safe and beneficial digital environment for children. However, effectively implementing age assurance has proved complex – particularly in light of the cross-border operations of many online services that children use. To inform the actions of policymakers and other key stakeholders, this report aims to shed light on the age assurance landscape. It examines the age-related policies and practices of 50 online services that children use and finds significant gaps in practice. Only two of the services examined systematically assure age at account creation, despite a further 26 having age assurance mechanisms. Often, age assurance is triggered – if at all – in certain circumstances only. Minimum ages tend to stem from considerations other than safety (such as privacy or contract law) and can vary depending on geographic location. Lastly, many services use age-tiered safeguards to adapt experiences to a child’s age, but they can often be turned off or rely on parental controls.
