Britain just told Big Tech to grow up. Regulator Ofcom unveiled 40 mandatory rules that will force every social network, gaming hub and search engine to verify ages, switch off “suggested” feeds by default, and quarantine violent, sexual or self-harm material from anyone under 18 by 25 July. Break the code and the fine is brutal: up to 10 % of global revenue—roughly $11 billion for Meta. In his House of Commons pitch, Tech Secretary Peter Kyle dangled a national 10 p.m. curfew for teens’ phones, calling doom-scroll fatigue a “public-health crisis.”
Platforms insist they’re on board—privately they’re furious about paying for age-scan tech that still miffs adult users. Safety advocates cheer the “watershed,” but remind lawmakers that VPN tutorials spread faster than homework memes: “Sixth-graders can out-hack any filter by lunch.”
