Reporter: Kim Hyeon, Dong Yingxue

Source: The 6th Survey Report on Internet Use of Minors in China

Recently, the topic of online privacy leakage involving minors has attracted a lot of attention. As Internet "natives", minors broaden their horizons, increase their knowledge, and express themselves through the Internet, but they also face massive amounts of information that are uneven and smart devices have potential security risks. The healthy growth of minors is inseparable from a clear and harmonious online environment. Starting today, this edition will launch a series of reports on the "Clear Online Environment for Minors", focusing on the new phenomena and new problems that have emerged in the current online environment for minors, exploring solutions, and protecting the online spiritual home of minors.

——Editor

"I've been 'unboxed', what should I do?" Recently, the topic of "unboxing" of cyberviolence involving minors has sparked heated discussions on the Internet.

Surfing the Internet has become a part of the lives of minors. However, new problems such as privacy leakage, APP "face change", and smart watches inducing addiction and comparison have brought hidden dangers, and the teenage mode sometimes "fails", causing parents to worry.

How to better protect the clean environment for minors to surf the Internet? This needs to be solved by the whole society.

The risk of "opening the box" and "changing the face" is great

Lin Xiao, a junior high school student in Chengdu, Sichuan, posted a photo of himself "supporting" on a celebrity super talk, and mistakenly took the cover of the uncoded homework book together. Enlarge the photo, and the information such as school, class, name, etc., is clearly visible. Immediately afterwards, the star's "home" fans locked Lin Xiao's address through this information and harassed him, and Lin Xiao's parents reported the case to the public security organs.

Lin Xiao's "unboxing" is an illegal act involving the privacy leakage of minors, which is serious and has attracted attention. Previously, some relevant departments found in law enforcement that some online platforms accepted anonymous contributions, exposed private information such as minors' names and schools, and published abusive remarks; Some Internet users spread the "unboxing and hanging people" tutorial; What's more, some businesses provide paid "scolding" services for minors.

Wang Zhenhui, a professor at China University of Political Science and Law, analyzed that the current online risks faced by minors mainly include personal privacy leakage, bad information exposure, online illegal infringement, and Internet addiction. Minors have strong social needs, and often "expose" their lives online, and the risk of personal privacy leakage also increases.

In the special action of "Rectification of the Internet Environment for Minors in the Summer of 8 Years" launched last year, the internet information departments in Beijing, Henan, Guizhou and other places thoroughly verified the clues of the problem, and disbanded and closed more than 0 topics, super talks, and post bars. In 0 years, the "Qing Lang" series of special actions will focus on 0 rectification tasks, including rectifying the "self-media" publishing false information, the abuse of AI technology, and the online environment for minors during the summer vacation.

Some Internet chaos arose because of "曬", and some came into being because of "hiding".

Not long ago, Zhang Shuang, a citizen of Beijing, said that his son, who is in elementary school, wants to use his mobile phone to download a software. After that, Zhang Shuang accidentally clicked on the software, and links to bad information and gambling advertisements appeared on the interface. It's obviously learning software, how can there be illegal content?

According to software engineer Haiyang, in the past, some APPs often disguised themselves as normal tool and video APPs when they were put on the shelves, evading the review of the app store, and after they were put on the shelves, they "transformed" into illegal software or inserted illegal links. In the special action of "Rectification of the Internet Environment for Minors in the Summer of 2024 Years", the relevant departments investigated and found the relevant "face-changing" APP and rectified it.

Some functions of smart watches induce addiction

Nowadays, children's smart watches have become the "wrist standard" for many children. A small watch can touch and add friends, NFC payment, and download software, just like a miniature smartphone. The new problems brought about by smart watches have also worried many parents.

On the one hand, the built-in apps of children's smartwatches can spread bad information. Not long ago, Li Yang, a citizen of Shanghai, discovered that his son, who had just entered elementary school, read novels that were not suitable for children to read through the reading software on his watch. He quickly checked the app and found that there was a lot of inappropriate content.

"Except for some people who deliberately spread bad information, some content in children's smart watch apps is not problematic from an adult perspective, but it is not suitable for minors." Fu Zitang, a professor at Southwest University of Political Science and Law, said.

On the other hand, some features of children's smartwatches can easily lead to addiction.

"My son has recently become obsessed with a 'memorize words, eat mushrooms' game on his watch, but it's mainly game-based and has very little to learn." A parent in Beijing said. Some games are played under the guise of learning to allow parents to relax their supervision. In addition, features such as points and friend circles are also easy to divert the attention of minors.

According to a smart watch product manager, at present, some children's smart devices lack a unified and standardized anti-addiction mechanism, and when parents neglect supervision, children are prone to addiction.

With the continuous upgrading of the functions of smart watches on the market, minors have also caught up with the "wrist trend". Chen Jie, a parent from Nanning, Guangxi, said that his child is 8 years old this year and has already bought a second smart watch, for the simple reason that "the child said that his friends laughed at his previous smart watch for being too bad." ”

Many parents have reported that because a certain brand of smart watches occupies most of the market, a specific dating circle has been formed, and watches of non-brands cannot add friends to each other, thus forming a certain degree of "brand contempt chain".

Fang Jiandong, a teacher at the Faculty of Education at Guangxi Normal University, pointed out that children may define their identity and status by the objects they own, and children's smart watches will also become part of their self-identity. ”

Teen mode experience is not good

Youth mode is an important measure to ensure the safety of minors using the Internet by restricting the use of software functions, time and content. However, whether the "protective wall" can be prevented, and whether the youth mode can be better used on a useful basis, depends on the actual effect. According to the "Youth Blue Book: Report on the Internet Use of Minors in China (2024)" released by the Institute of Journalism and Communication of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, the proportion of minors using the youth model is not high overall.

Ms. Zhang's child is in the second year of junior high school and usually likes to watch short videos. Hearing from a friend that the software could turn on the teen mode, she immediately tried it, but was opposed by the child. "After turning on the teen mode, only cartoons are pushed." Ms. Zhang's child, Fangfang, said, "It's all in junior high school, who wants to watch this?" ”

At present, the content supply of youth mode needs to be enriched, and the user experience is relatively simple. More needs to be done to make children willing to use and love to use the youth mode.

After experiencing the youth mode of some platforms, the reporter found that many platforms could only browse the content pushed on the homepage after turning on the youth mode, and could not search, comment, etc. "After a while, the child was clamoring to turn it off." Parents said that after the closure, they were worried that their children would be exposed to bad information.

In addition, the teen mode can sometimes "fail". On some second-hand platforms, there are also cases where selling accounts "bypass" the youth mode, and you can often buy a video platform account for only a dozen to dozens of yuan.

Zhang Xiaobing, deputy director of the Institute of Children and Youth Studies of the China Youth Research Center, suggested that relevant departments should conduct research on the youth model and invite teenagers to talk about problems and make suggestions. The youth mode can only be truly easy to use and practical if minors love to use it.

(Reporter Yang Hao participated in the writing, and the parents and minors in the article are pseudonyms)

Message board for netizens

The system continues to push interesting content according to browsing habits, which will cause children to be addicted to a single information, and it is hoped that the youth mode will push more traditional culture, scientific and technological knowledge and other content to break the "information cocoon".

——Beijing Netizen

It is hoped that the supervision of relevant enterprises will be strengthened, and they will be urged to implement anti-addiction measures, such as real-name registration and login, and restrictions on the time for minors to use them.

——Tianjin Netizen

The number of vicious words in the comment areas of some short video apps has increased rapidly, seriously affecting the physical and mental health of minors.

——Chongqing netizens

It is very necessary to carry out scientific online education, educate children on how to deal with Internet information, and strengthen children's self-thinking ability, instead of following the crowd and following the crowd.

——Guangxi netizens

It is suggested that the coverage of youth mode should be expanded from APP to more ports, so as to realize the tripartite linkage of mobile smart terminals, applications and application distribution platforms.

——Yunnan netizens

(The above message is excerpted from People's Daily Online's "People's Suggestions", compiled by Shi Yunjuan)