In 2022, the scale of underage netizens in China will be 19.3 billion people, and the Internet penetration rate of minors is 972%。
According to the "Fifth National Survey Report on the Internet Use of Minors" (hereinafter referred to as the "Report") jointly released by the Department of Safeguarding the Rights and Interests of Adolescents of the Communist Youth League and the China Internet Network Information Center, the scale of underage Internet users continues to expand, and the Internet penetration rate has basically peaked.
Against this backdrop, the Regulations on the Protection of Minors Online, which will come into force on January 1, 2024, are timely and significant. At present, China has established a multi-level and multi-dimensional system of laws, regulations, and systems, including the Cybersecurity Law, the Protection of Minors**, the Regulations on the Protection of Minors Online, and the Provisions on the Online Protection of Children's Personal Information, to give priority to the protection of the lawful rights and interests of minors in cyberspace.
The life of the law lies in its implementation. Through the investigation of minors' online use, behavior, and online environment, it is helpful to deepen the understanding and grasp of minors' online protection, do a good job of policy advocacy and social advocacy in a targeted manner, and take corresponding measures to promote the implementation of relevant laws and regulations, so as to better protect the 'digital natives'. Yuan Ningning, executive deputy director of the Juvenile Affairs Governance and Legal Research Base of China University of Political Science and Law, said in an interview with the reporter of "Rule of Law".
The online entertainment management system is becoming more and more perfect
In recent years, the management system of online entertainment has been increasingly improved, and the supervision of bad Internet use has become increasingly strict. In addition to studying, entertainment is an important motivation for minors to use the Internet, but at the same time, problems such as privacy leakage, excessive consumption, Internet addiction and cybercrime that may be brought about have also attracted social attention.
The report pointed out that in the past few years, China's management system for minors' online entertainment behavior has been increasingly improved, and documents such as the Notice on Preventing Minors from Becoming Addicted to Online Games and the Notice on Further Strict Management to Effectively Prevent Minors from Becoming Addicted to Online Games have been issued and implemented, and clear provisions have been put forward on minors' gaming time and consumption.615% of underage Internet users believe that the current management method of limiting the time spent playing games has significantly reduced the time they or their classmates can play games. In addition, minors' participation in online live streaming activities has also been effectively managed, and the proportion of regular online live broadcasts has increased from 19 in 20198% to 16 in 20221%。"Opinions of the People's Republic of China on the Protection of Minors**" on Regulating Online Live Streaming Tipping and Strengthening the Protection of Minors" and other laws and policies require that minors be prohibited from participating in live streaming and that minors be strictly controlled from engaging in anchoring.
The report shows that despite the increase in the percentage of underage internet users playing games, the majority of underage internet users are positive about the current management of time limit on gaming time. It is worth noting that as the management of minors' game accounts becomes more and more stringent, some minors will use their parents' accounts to play games, so as to circumvent the restrictions on game time. Data shows that 32% of minors who play online games use their parents' accounts to play games39.1% of parents said they would let their children use their own accounts to play games.
According to Sun Hongyan, director of the Institute of Children and Youth Studies at the China Youth Research Center, guiding parents to set an example for their children and improve their management skills is crucial to prevent minors from becoming addicted to the Internet.
On the one hand, it is clear that 'family is the first lesson of life', guiding parents to take the initiative to take responsibility for teaching minors to use the Internet correctly, and encouraging parents to set a good example for their children. On the other hand, parents are trained in their ability to use the Internet, and through community training, parent schools, etc., so that parents have the skills to properly manage minors' access to the Internet. Sun Hongyan said.
Continue to improve the regulation of ** applications
The report shows that the number of short** users has increased significantly, and has become an important channel for minors to obtain information. In the past few years, short** apps have been widely popular among minors, and their rich content, short and fast methods, simple operation and interest-based push mechanism are very attractive to underage users.
The data shows that the proportion of underage netizens who often watch short ** has increased from 40 in 20185% to 54 in 20221%, an increase of 13 in 5 years6 percentage points, the number of minor users exceeded 100 million, 329% of underage netizens said that they had used Douyin, Kuaishou, WeChat, etc. to shoot and post short ** in the past year. At the same time, ** platforms have also surpassed TV and become the main channel for minors to obtain news events and major news. The survey found that 559% of underage netizens get news events and major news through ** platforms such as Douyin, Kuaishou, and Bilibili, but only 473% of underage netizens will consciously distinguish whether it is an official release or a self-release, and more than half of users do not have the awareness of identification or have not thought about this problem.
The report points out that ** apps have become an important entertainment and leisure tool and information acquisition channel for minors in their daily lives, but at the same time, the problems that they may lead to such as excessive use, information cocooning, and bad inducement cannot be ignored. In this regard, it is recommended to improve the supervision of ** applications and strengthen the positive guidance of content.
The report suggests that we should promote the formation of a benign competition mechanism for the short-term industry, continue to improve the problems of lax review and control of some platforms, unscientific recommendation algorithms, and unreasonable traffic distribution mechanisms, so as to avoid "bad money driving out good money" and realize the healthy development of the short-term industry. At the same time, continue to promote the popularization of the youth model, further improve the function, form a content pool standard for minors as soon as possible, and use technical means to help minors watch short videos with high quality and moderation. In addition, it is also necessary for all parties in society to jointly promote the improvement of the quality of short content, guide healthy and active content creation, combine the interests and hobbies of minor groups, launch excellent content that can play an entertaining role for minors, and severely crack down on sensationalism, false news, and content themes with distorted values.
If the right thing is not occupied, the wrong thing will be occupied. Emphasis should be placed on the impact of ** platforms on minors' values, providing more high-quality content and innovating methods of publicity and education, and doing a good job of efforts on the establishment of minors' ideology and morality and efforts to popularize the law. Yuan Ningning said.
Pay attention to new cyber security risks and hidden dangers
The report shows that the protection of minors online has been continuously strengthened, and the cyber security environment has improved significantly.
In recent years, systems related to the protection of minors online have become increasingly sound, and schools, families, society and other parties have made concerted efforts to weave a "protective net" for minors. The Cybersecurity Law, the Provisions on the Protection of Minors, and the Provisions on the Online Protection of Children's Personal Information all make special provisions on the protection of the lawful rights and interests of minors online. In this context, minors' sense of cyber security has steadily improved.
The report shows that 871% of underage Internet users are aware of at least one law or policy related to minors going online, but only 169% of underage Internet users have a comprehensive understanding of the laws or policies related to minors' access to the Internet that have been introduced in recent years.
At present, the cybersecurity issues of minors are both in terms of hardware products and in the soft environment, which requires that relevant work must keep pace with the times, dynamically adjust, and continuously improve. In this regard, the report recommends that attention be paid to new cyber security risks and hidden dangers, and strengthen cyber law enforcement and security education.
The report proposes to strictly manage the safety of smart products such as smart watches, smart desk lamps, and dictionary pens specifically for minors, improve relevant product standards, and improve market access mechanisms. Strengthen the regulation of the collection and management of sensitive data such as minors' personal information and location information, focusing on combating malware that disseminates illegal content and negative information in the name of educational applications, and consolidating the entity responsibility of application distribution platforms. Strengthen publicity, education, and law enforcement inspections of laws and regulations such as the Protection of Minors, the Law on the Promotion of Family Education, and the "Regulations on the Protection of Minors Online", strengthen education on responding to new types of online fraud, increase minors' awareness and vigilance against new forms of fraud in the name of celebrity fan groups, concert ticket transfers, and so forth, and continue to dynamically adjust the content of education for new forms of cybercrime.
Yu Xukun, executive director of the Beijing Juvenile Legal Aid and Research Center, suggested that relevant online platform service providers should conduct a comprehensive inspection of their own online protection mechanisms for minors and their efforts to protect minors in accordance with the requirements of relevant laws and policies such as the Protection of Minors and the Regulations on the Protection of Minors Online, promptly fill in the loopholes, and fix some problems that may exist, so as to better protect the "digital natives".
*:Rule of law**.