There are fresh calls for increased regulation of social media sites after a new study found that algorithms are pushing weight-loss messages to teenagers.
The study saw researchers setting up a series of ‘Mystery shopper’ Instagram accounts mirroring those of real children.
They then began liking certain posts to see how quickly the network's algorithm would begin pushing harmful content.
In one case, the material pushed to a profile set up for 17-year-old girl radically changed after she clicked two links related to weight loss. The account’s explore feed began to feature substantially more content relating to weight loss, exercise, body sculpting and photoshopped body images.
The researchers found similar results with profiles set up for a 15-year-old girl and a 14-year-old boy.
On Newstalk Breakfast this morning, Cyber Safe Kids CEO Alex Cooney said we need far more regulation of social media sites.
“It is a problem that has arisen before and what we need to do is regulate,” she said. “We need much greater accountability.
“There is an age-appropriate design code being rolled out in the UK later this year and we want to see that rolled out across the board.
“We want to see safe and ethical design and children-centred design being rolled out so that there is much greater accountability.
“We also need good education. We need to empower young people online to really question the content they are coming across.
“To challenge things to understand advertising, misinformation and disinformation online – we have got a lot to do. This stuff has sort of caught up with us but it certainly is not acceptable moving forward.”
She said the finding are especially concerning when mixed with Cyber Safe Kids research which found that large proportions of children under 13 are also using social media sites.
“We have data on eight to 12-year-olds and in our last year’s findings, there were 65% of them signed up to these sites,” she said.
“So, we know there are children putting in fake ages in order to access these services.
“This information is being pushed at them and it is really disturbing but there is also this real fear of missing out – children enjoy being there but they don’t like the darker side of it.”
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