YouTube and other social media platforms increase parental control as online safety of minors continues to be a hot topic internationally.
A platform owned by Google declare on Wednesday which imposes additional parental controls, particularly on the amount of time children and teenagers spend watching YouTube Shorts.
Parents will now be able to set a time limit for when their children’s accounts can be used to watch Shorts – similar to YouTube TikToks or Instagram Reels – helping to limit the potential time wasted by mindlessly scrolling.
Parents can even block their account from watching Shorts altogether – permanently, or temporarily, like if a child is supposed to be using YouTube to study for a test by watching educational content.
YouTube will also let parents set special Bedtime and Take a Break reminders, which encourage users to stop watching videos. The feature is also available for adults, who can choose to set their own limits and reminders.
For parents who also use YouTube, it can be a challenge to switch back and forth between an adult account and a child account – unless you want your algorithm to take over Bluey forever. In the coming weeks, YouTube says it will update the sign-up experience in the app to make it easier for parents and kids to switch between accounts with just a few taps…
The feature is based on YouTube’s existing parental controls for teens, which include the ability to monitor teen channel activity if they create content. This has become an industry standard, as TikTok, Snapchat, Instagram, and Facebook have the same control.
Last year, YouTube was also announced age estimation technology to predict whether the account belongs to teenagers in order to provide a more age-appropriate experience.