Social Networking Websites

What age is
right?
With special references to European initiatives for underage users
The Indian scenario of the cyberspace is alarming. With users increasing in multiple folds, crime
rate soaring ever higher and the youth being the victim as well as the criminal, the Indian law is
unable to identify and provide rights and liabilities to these young netizens. As more and more
surveys and studies prove the abuse over social media networks, it becomes the need of the
hour to protect the future of the country online. Today privacy and security are the concerns
rest of the world is looking at on these websites, whereas, in India, we have not yet given
recognition to users under the age of 18. The cyber law governing the land needs to be
dynamic. This paper brings out the problems in the legal framework and aims to devise
solutions to the problem.

Nitish Chandan

1. Introduction:
It is clear that India is no longer bound by states virtually. We strive to be more united
and connected virtually to the people in our lives. Social media websites have turned
out to be one of the coolest places for kids and means of socializing for their busy
parents. But
where are we
actually taking this
virtual life of ours.
Are the kids of this
India headed in
the right direction?
Are they safe? Are
they surfing the
way they should?
A social
networking site
focuses on
building online
communities of
people who share
interests and/or
activities, or who
are interested in
exploring the
interests and
activities of others.
Most social
network services
are web based
and provide a
variety of ways for users to interact, such as e-mail and instant messaging services.
Social networking has encouraged new ways to communicate and share information.
Social networking websites are being used regularly by millions of people. Although the
features of social networking sites differ, they all allow users to provide information
about them and offer some type of communication mechanism (forums, chat rooms,
email, and instant messenger) that enables them to connect with other users. On some
sites, we can browse for people based on certain criteria, while other sites require that
we be "introduced" to new people through a connection we share. Many of the sites
have communities or subgroups that may be based on a particular interest.

India is the third biggest Facebook market which have nearly 4.98 crore users.1
Semiocast, a social media monitoring tool, has rated India as the sixth highest user of
Twitter. While globally the negative side of unmitigated use of social media is
articulated, India has embraced social media without being too bothered about its
possible hazards.2 According to a Microsoft study in June 2012, more than 50% of the
children in India using the internet are either threatened or harassed online. The Global
Youth Online Behaviour Survey conducted by Microsoft, revealed that 53% of the
surveyed children aged between eight and 17 in India admitted they were victims of
cyber bullying.3 A survey conducted by Tata Consultancy Services found that while 84
percent of the respondents had internet access at home, 85 percent used social
networking site such as Facebook and 79 percent owned mobile phone.4
Sixty-five per cent of children aged 8 to 18 have access to a mobile handset. Of children
who have mobile phones, 81% use a new handset and 20% own smartphones.
Smartphone ownership is particularly high in Chile, with 44% of children with a mobile
owning one; Japan follows Chile with 27% owning a smartphone. Across the five
countries, 12 is the most common age for a child to first own a mobile phone. However,
there are significant variations by country; for example, in India and Japan it is more
common for children to first own a phone when they are 15 years old, whereas in Chile,
10 is the most common age. The calling and texting habits of children differ across
countries and by age. Generally, younger children use their mobile phone initially to
make calls rather than send text messages. However their use of text messaging
overtakes calling as children get older.5
The most popular pre-installed mobile phone function used by children is a camera
(more than 75%), with the highest use in India (99%) and the lowest in Egypt (75%).
Music players are the second most popular function, with approximately 60% of all
children who have them on their phones using them. There is evidence to suggest that
tablet use has increased, but it is still relatively low compared to mobile phone use.
Egypt and Chile have the highest tablet use at 18%, while the others have a penetration
rate of 7% or less.
Children often search the web with innocent words but get awful lot of results. There are
words like toys, bum, dogs etc. that lead to porn sites instead of their desired
destination. There are some 30% of the porn sites using popular brands like Barbie,
Disney, Popeye, Pokemon, power rangers, snow white and seven dwarfs etc in their
websites. Therefore, it is easy for a child to reach a pornography site. Now, the social
1

According to the social media company Socialbakers.

http://www.dnaindia.com/lifestyle/report_cyberbullying-social-media-s-darker-side_171208
3
http://www.microsoft.com/security/resources/research.aspx
4
Tata Consultancy GenY Survey 2011-2012 of nearly 12,300 high school students across 12 Indian cities.
5
http://www.gsma.com/publicpolicy/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/GSMA-ChildrenES_English2012WEB.pdf
2

networking also adds a source for the sexual content for those who would not otherwise
find such stuff. Some profiles are targeted at adults to sell porn contents and spread
nudity and spam. Those profiles also very close to the children if they use social
networking.
A petition recently filed in the Supreme Court of India said, "The sexual content that kids
are accessing today is far more graphic, violent, brutal, deviant and destructive and has
put entire society in danger and also poses threat to public order in India. Most offences
committed against women/girls/children are fuelled by pornography. The worrying issue
is that the severity and gravity of such images is increasing. It is a matter of serious
concern that prepubescent children are being raped.
A Class 10 student stabbing his classmate in a central Delhi school, apparently miffed
at the latter posting his photograph on Facebook. Now, it is common among the school
students to create a page on their teacher on a social networking site in order to make
fun of and abuse him. It is also possible that the child exposed to pornography may
incite children to act out sexually against other children. In this case, child may have to
face legal proceedings that eventually end in the rehabilitation center. Child behavioral
impact is the next big issue arising out of the use of social networking. Children at this
age can be easily influenced by others like peer influences, celebrity influence and even
some adult content influence. These influences can easily dilute the core moral value of
the child. It is some time alarming situation for the whole society. Relationships going
online will reduce the capacity of the children to understand the pros and cons of the
real world. Individualism by the social networking is creating a new style of life, a style
where individuals come first. Individualism restrains the habit of understanding and
accepting the relationship. With the increase in the uncensored use of social
networking, kids are vulnerable to online fraud and aggressive marketing techniques as
well.

2. The legal Scenario

Now to answer the question: What age is right? The youth today is falling victim to
addiction of the social networks. There is a saying that one tends to do an act he is
prohibited from doing all through he grows up. The legal framework of India does not
allow anyone under the age of 18 years to join any social network, and for some
reasons it is a matter of great pride for kids to join these networks creating profiles with
fake ages. Following is a summary of the age restriction as specified by these social
networks.

In India however, why the age as suggested by Facebook is also not applicable is a
rather strange issue. United Nations Convention on the Rights of a child defines child
as every human being below the age of 18 years unless, under the law of the land
applicable to the child or majority is attained earlier. Article 23 of the Constitution of
India says that children below the age of 13 years should not be employed to work in
any factory, mine or engage in any other hazardous employment. To know the right

child age we may even look into the Indian Penal code (IPC). IPC puts criminal
responsibility above seven years. Under section 82 of the IPC nothing is an offence
which is done by the child under the age of seven. Under section 83, offence committed
by the child aged between seven and twelve, who has not attained sufficient maturity of
understanding to judge of the nature and consequences of his conduct on that occasion
is not punishable. But this section gives a wide discretion to the judiciary to decide
whether the child is matured or not. In addition, section 90 of the IPC states as the
consent given by the person who is under the age of twelve is not valid. Anyone who
abetted the commission of suicide of child under the age of eighteen years will be
punishable under section 305 of the IPC. Next important Act to look for the age of a
child is Indian Contract Act, 1872. According to this Act, a person under the age of
eighteen has no capacity to enter into a contract. The other Act that is closely related to
this topic is Child Marriage Restriction Act, 1926. According to this Act a child means a
male who has not completed the 21 years of age and in case of a female, it is who has
not completed the age of 18. The Juvenile Justice Act, 1960 states that a juvenile is a
child who has not completed the age of 16 years in case of a boy if female she has not
completed the age of 18 years. According to the Child Labour (Prohibition and
Regulation) Act, 1966 the age is fixed as who has not completed his fourteen years of
age. Factories Act, 1948 restricts a child below the age of fourteen to work in any
factory.
Can we have so many definitions to who a child is? The only reason the 18 year limit is
posed on using social networks is because of the fact that one has to enter into a
contract with the social network by accepting their terms and conditions. And in such a
case the Indian Contract Act is applied where 18 is the age for maturity. Technically,
leave alone the ICA, even the IT Act, 2000 and its amendments do not give even
recognition to childrens use of social media. However, the reality is different. In 2011 a
survey conducted by global security technology firm McAfee in ten major cities across
India revealed that that 62 per cent of affluent kids in the age group of 4-12 years have
an e-mail ID, while 58 per cent of them have an account on social networking sites.
After all, more than half of the parents with 12 year olds said in a recent survey that their
child already have an account and most have lied about their kids age to help them
open it. Faking age for the purpose of entering into a contract amounts to
misrepresentation under section 18 of the Indian Contract Act. Also, the consent given
by the child is not at all a valid consent and the contract is void ab initio. Therefore, the
contract is not binding on the party. In such a case, the child is the victim all the time.
Lets deal with what is misrepresentation to find out the consequences of the
misrepresentation by child.
Various social networking sites like facebook prescribe the minimum age to register as
a user is 13 and it is a standard form of contract. However, it leaves the option in the

hands of the countries in which they are utilizing their service. Consumer Reports has
found in its 2011 State of the Net Survey that More than 5 million children are under the
age of 10 and well under Facebooks minimum age of 13, use the service. According to
Consumer Reports, out of the 20 million minors who actively use Facebook, 7.5 million
are younger than 13, while more than five million are younger than 10.6

3. What needs to be done?

It is inevitable to not make note of the infamous European Council agreement that
happened a couple of years ago. At London, including Facebook, Google, Yahoo and
Microsoft, a total of 17 web firms signed up for the first European agreement to help
protect children from harm when using social networking sites. The first every Social
Networking task force was set up to fight the major threats that they observed in Europe
and came out with this agreement. The social networks agreed that they would provide
an easy to use and accessible report abuse' button, make sure that the full online
profiles and contact lists of website users who are registered as under 18s are set to
private' by default, and prevent under-age users from using their services and many
other such clauses.7
If Europe can take such innovative measures in their system, when they do not even
have as many users as India does, cant the Indian legislation begin with strengthening
itself to support kids in a legal framework on these social platforms?.
The first suggestion through this paper is to lay down a provision for legalizing the use
of social media by kids above 13 years of age. After a lot of informal talks with kids, it
has been observed that one major reason that kids do not tell their parents about their
profiles and that they are bullied or tortured online is the fact that their parents would not
accept it and would ban their use of social media straightaway. This legalizing of a
minimum age can make the bridge between parents and the kids go away, the parents
can be more frank with their kids and the kids will also feel that they have legal rights.
Otherwise all they feel is that they are faking their age on these platforms and it is just
that nobody questions is the reason they are safe.
Secondly, for the sake of the children, the Indian government should get into agreement
with at least a few social media giants and include a few reforms. One thing could be a
panic button for kids below 18 and the report abuse integration. All profiles of kids under
18 should be made non-searchable and private and they should have a limit on the
content that they see. For the kids who are less than 13 years of age also, there should
6
7

http://news.consumerreports.org/electronics/2011/05/five-million-facebook-users-are-10-or-younger.html
http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-09-232_en.htm

be integration with facebook to shut these ids down and physically report the adults of
the house. Thirdly after the first two are implemented, it becomes necessary to enforce
law on the kids also, so just to make them alert of what they do on the internet, their
faking age should be brought under the ambit of law and at least a rehabilitation should
be the legal consequence for such an act. A public notification in this regard only can be
a very influential step in alerting the youth of today.