SENATOR Imee Marcos has filed a measure establishing a minimum age for social media use.

In Senate Bill No. 1735, or the proposed Social Media Safety Act, Marcos is also pushing to prescribe obligations for social media platforms.

According to UNICEF, as of 2020, about 60 percent of Filipino children aged 10 to 17 are active internet users.

Filipino children generally first go online at age 10, although this age has been decreasing, Marcos said in her explanatory note.

She added that Plan International Philippines released a 2024 report on the digital platform activity of children, showing that they primarily use digital platforms for communication (64.3%), education (47.7%), leisure (37.2%), and stress reduction (34.3%). Facebook (33.2%) and Messenger (23.3%) were the most widely used platforms, followed by TikTok (23%), Instagram (13.9%), and Twitter/X (6.6%).

Despite widespread use, the senator noted that children and youth in the Philippines are regularly exposed to online content or behavior that makes them feel unsafe.

She added that extreme, inappropriate, and harmful content continues to be easily accessible to children and adolescents. In certain cases, childhood deaths have been linked to suicide and self-harm-related content and risk-taking challenges on social media platforms.

This may be especially risky for children and adolescents who are already experiencing mental health issues, Marcos stressed.

Thus, limiting the use of social media has been associated with mental health benefits for young people and adults. The measure aims to protect the youth against the harmful effects of social media by restricting children below the age of 16 from accessing social media services.